Picking up the Pieces
by Dark Hunter
Summary: Sequel to "Falling to Pieces" Contains violence/gore, profanity, yaoi, the works. Yay?
1. Chapter One

Okay, a few things for new readers. This is a sequel. To understand most things, you really would need to have read my previous fanfiction "Falling to Pieces" For those who've managed to wade through "Falling to Pieces", and are now flocking for the promised continuation... well... here be monsters. -stops- Wait, that wasn't what I meant to say. Gah. Anyway: sequel, must read prequel first. YAY! Dark Hunter's back! Sorry I was so lazy! Chocolate covered thanks for Melissa and Tannim Tae for reading through this chapter beforehand to let me know whether or not it was as big a pile of crap as I thought it was. I've been informed it isn't, but if you-the readers-out there see anything you feel I should fix, feel free to rant at me!  
  
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Ken had searched the bathroom at least five times before turning on the water, finally ready for the ten-minute shower that was all he was capable of coaxing from the decrepit water heater.  
  
There shouldn't have been any insects around to climb into the tub with him, but when he felt something against his toe and looked down, there it was. Another one of those loathsome, glistening, disease carriers. Yet another one of the many roaches infesting his home. In his fucking shower. He vehemently washed it down the drain, watching its repeated attempts to climb back out again for the two minutes it took to drown. He finished the shower in a self-righteous mixture of rage and disgust, renewing a struggle to tamp down the unheralded emotions.  
  
Having grown up in a fairly strict setting, Ken had learned to hide his ire at an early age, though he never mastered total dispersal. It was always the little things that set him off. A string of bad days culminating in a batch of burnt toast, a misinterpreted laugh. It was always that one tiny little pet peeve that would come crashing down on his defenseless patience. A cockroach in his shower.  
  
As a precaution, it was customary for him to go into a self-imposed isolation when his blood began to boil, internalizing the anger until he burnt himself out beyond the point of caring. No one had noticed any of this yet, not even Omi. Poor Omi, waiting in the next room; doing a crossword puzzle, still in bed and wearing his pajamas.  
  
He couldn't easily avoid Omi, right outside the door. Waiting with his big blue eyes and his unending cheer, an accident waiting to happen.  
  
No other option presented itself to Ken, and he steeled his nerves, knowing a shut mouth was the only way to keep from blasting those who least deserved it.   
  
Omi liked to talk. To Ken. All the time. About anything he could come up with. The weather, the state of household repairs, a new recipe he'd found, one more proclamation of his love for Ken. It was the latter, of course, which set off his temper. How could anyone willing look into those eyes, day after day and lie? Respond with the expected "I love you" that the fragile blonde child expected?  
  
Before he could help himself, Ken was yelling about anything that readily came to mind: his hatred of this home, its unexpected infestation, their lying son of a bitch of a real estate agent, his inability to tolerate all the aspects of his life, his desire to leave them all behind to this hell house and to each other. And then he'd told Omi that he couldn't stand any more of the boy's pathetic clinging or his constant inability to cope without being reminded that he was cared for. Not in those words exactly. The version from his lips had involved a hell of a lot more profanity.  
  
Then Ken shut his mouth, pulled on the rest of his clothes and left. It was the only way he could dam that callous, violent flow of words. Lacking any local escape, he sat on the front porch, envying Youji's old smoking addiction. At least with a cigarette in hand, one could truly appear to be brooding. It shouoldn't be long before Omi showed up, looking so unbearably sad and alone as he often did. Ken wasn't up to coping with that right now.  
  
The whole house was nothing but a frustration. An entire month of repairs, redecorating, painting, rewiring and furnishing and it still needed more work, that and a fortune's worth of roach prevention merchandise. A poison bait trap for each room, each corner, underneath every still-standing object.  
  
The water never stayed hot for long. None of the upstairs lights worked, faulty wiring that no one had been able to fix yet, even expensive professionals. He was afraid they'd burn everything down with their endless parade of candles and lanterns, but they couldn't very well stumble around in the dark, could they? The stove was gas and difficult to cook with. The heating was pathetic, coming out of ceiling vents and warming nothing but the overhead light fixtures. Youji suffered the most from the lack of heat, but that's not to say it didn't wear on them all.   
  
No, he couldn't face Omi yet. Not with all these annoyances already running through his head. He prayed to the nameless, dark things that watched over kind-hearted assassins to keep Omi away. The deities of death-bringers didn't listen. They rarely did.  
  
"Ken? You almost through skulking about out here?"  
  
Well, they sort of listened, those faceless gods. It was only Youji, leaning against the other side of the rickety wooden porch, down jacketed and shoeless. Ken wondered how loud a fuss Youji would make when he finally got some splinters jabbed into his unwisely bare feet. Ken wondered if he himself had calmed down to the point where he wouldn't laugh when that happened to Youji.  
  
Youji dropped down next to him, sitting hunched up on the top step. "You really should apologize to Omi."  
  
"For what?" Ken kept the words as blank as he could.  
  
"Hey, the walls are thin, if we can hear each other in the middle of the night making the wrong kinds of noises, then obviously your shouting wouldn't be an issue." Youji tapped his hands together, wishing for a cigarette. Evenings like this one were just made for a nice smoke out back while one watched the sun set. Granted, Aya would put his booted foot clear up Youji's ass if he ever caught him smoking again, but the thought still remained, untromped.   
  
Ken sighed, snapping Youji back from his current, wistful train of thought. "I can't help it. I was in a horrible mood and then he just kept talking at me, saying he loved me, talking about pointless things. On and on. It gets a bit overwhelming after the first two minutes or so." Ken looked behind him, making sure no one else was around. "Youji, I can't keep this up much longer. It's too much like a real relationship. That's not what I signed on for. That's not what I ever thought this would turn into."  
  
"So, you're planning on abandoning? Are you still going to stay in this house with the person you lied to and hurt for months running?" Youji spread his hands wide, unsure of what council to give his friend.  
  
"I don't know." Ken ran a hand through his hair, sighed. "I don't know what I'm going to do. I can't keep doing this. Telling him I care even if I don't, not the way he wants me to. The way I've been telling him I do. I don't know how this could wind up as anything but a messy situation."  
  
"Tell him that. Tell him you're not feeling so great about an uber-dependant relationship and you feel you should both back off on the strong feelings for a while longer. Something along those lines."  
  
"It's a little too late for that, a year and four months into the issue. There's no way I can get out of this without hurting his feelings."  
  
Youji smiled tightly. "I'm thinking you'd better formulate a harmless solution pretty damned fast. Both Aya and I would be more than willing to beat the crap out of you if you hurt the kid." He leaned over and placed a seemingly friendly hand on Ken's shoulder. "You're just as much a friend as he is, but you're more capable of taking care of yourself. And you're older and should have known better to begin with. Whatever you do, be careful." He smiled again, shaking out lanky limbs and padding back inside, his feet still free of splinters.  
  
Ken remained, pulling his coat a little tighter around his body, hoping this new isolation would last. It wasn't three against one, as the odds were want to appear. Aya and Youji would be hostile for a while if he upset Omi, but he wouldn't lose them as friends, and he might not lose Omi. Without Omi, without even a distant friendship, things seemed a tiny bit bleaker.  
  
The sky faded to denim shades, to a deeper, purer indigo, and then finally attained its true moonless ink. Ken's stomach had been rumbling for the past hour or so, maybe longer than that. As his body temperature dropped, his anger wore down, furious inner monologues hushing to occasional whispered thoughts. He wasn't angry any more, but he hadn't worked out the right apology and therefore lacked a reason to return to the comparatively warmer house.  
  
Finally working out enough partially true responses/explanations to throw at Omi, Ken stumbled to his feet, muscles cramped up from sitting without moving for so long. It was common practice for assassins to exercise lengthy periods of stillness, but the painlessness only lasted as long as the body remained unmoving. Then the blood came flowing back into extremities, tingling and pinpricking. That was his least favorite part, trying to stand on burning feet. He caught his hand on the railing; got a palmful of wooden slivers ground into his skin for his balancing troubles.  
  
"Dammit! Why couldn't it have been Youji's feet?" Ken refrained from smacking a hand to his forehead, figuring he'd transfer the splinters to his face as well. Time to go in and face the beast. Then he could hide in the bathroom while Omi made sad eyes at the door. There used to be a drug store first-aid kit under the sink, including a pair of tweezers. The wood slivers would be hard to get out by candlelight, but it had to be done.  
  
Glaring at his hand, he stomped inside, past Youji and the blaring TV. "Aya wants to see you. He's in the kitchen!" Youji called helpfully after Ken's tensed back.  
  
More threats of violence were all Ken was expecting. Instead he received a tray full of food: sandwiches and pasta. "He hasn't eaten and neither have you. Be nice or I'll break every bone in your body." Aya also gave Ken a friendly pat on the shoulder before disappearing through a darkened doorframe, his gait still awkward, unhealed, off to spend more time with his co-conspirator.  
  
The box of tools left on the top step almost wound up sending Ken on a fast and painful trip back down the stairs, but he exercised his usual brand of unappreciated luck and grace and didn't even spill the pasta, letting out a sigh of relief as his feet planted themselves firmly on the hallway carpet. No lights, but he knew where their door was, down to a footstep count by this point.  
  
Omi sat on the bed, fists clenched in the sheets, shoulders hunched. He didn't look up as the door opened. Who else would it be? Enough hours had gone by, Ken must be through wallowing in guilt. Now it was time for Ken to show up and act cheerful, pretending nothing had happened. A thoroughly established pattern. An infuriating selective-memory. There was a soft clink as something was presumably set down, then a flare of light in the darkness as Ken went around the room, lighting candles.  
  
"Did you stay right here the whole time?" Ken finally asked awkwardly. He stopped at the foot of the bed, watching Omi's fists clench and unclench.  
  
"Sometimes you get like that and can't stand to be around people, especially me," the younger boy started. "Why don't you try telling me ahead of time instead of blowing up at me? I'd never do anything like that, take out my anger on the nearest people. Now really isn't the time for you to pretend everything is okay between us and that you haven't done anything even the slightest bit wrong. Go sleep on the couch; leave me alone until tomorrow. I don't feel much like talking to you."  
  
"Omi, I'm sorry! What else am I supposed to say or do?" Ken lost track of all his originally planned apologies and rationales. Only nine sentences into the discussion and already things weren't going according to his planning. Omi never went on the offensive. He certainly wasn't supposed to start now. Ken perched on the side of the bed, trying to herd things back to his original plan.  
  
"Sometimes I do lose my temper. I don't get a warning either, so how could I give you one? I don't mean to. I don't mean anything I say at times like that, I'm just ranting, blowing off some steam."  
  
"Then why would you say shit like that at all, if you don't mean it?!" Omi exploded, throwing in uncharacteristic profanity, a further sign of how upset he was; slamming a fist down on the mattress. "You're so blunt it's downright painful to watch most of the time. You never say things you don't think or mean at least on some levels. Everything you said to me, none of it was calculated; that's not how you work. You'd never sit down and make lists of the things you knew would hurt me the next time you get angry; you just say whatever comes to mind without a second of hesitation. You're even more likely to speak without thinking when you're mad. You'd never say something you hadn't already felt or thought."  
  
"Sounds like you've already got a nice little speech plotted out, should I just wait while you get it off your chest?" Ken couldn't help the flare of resentment. Yes, he was blunt, that was a well-known fact. A lot of people considered it to be one of his redeeming features. It was one thing to be the evil, accused one in a situation, it was quite another to be the evil, accused one, spitting out flustered, clumsy words while his opponent had entire dialogues lined up for his usage.  
  
Omi's lower lip trembled and he looked down. "If you don't want to hear it, you don't have to."  
  
"Now you're putting words in my mouth. I just want a chance to try to explain things to you, and then you can tell me what a horrible jerk I am until the sun comes up again. Just because I say something that may reflect my thoughts at the time, that doesn't mean I'm thinking anything even remotely similar five minutes later. I was mad and I was thinking a lot of angry, irrational things that I normally wouldn't even have crossing my mind. Obviously, if my tongue is as overwhelmingly influenced by strong emotions as you'd like to believe, then wouldn't it make sense for me to have brought up any number of those topics at an earlier date."  
  
"You're always influenced by strong emotions. The things you won't come out and say to my face; you express them all with your eyes and your reactions. I know you're tired of me, of being chained to me like some sort of dead weight bent on slowing your progress and making your life miserable. And I know-" Omi stops, his jaw clenching. For a moment Ken thought Omi was finally going to give up and cry, but then blue eyes closed tightly and pale lips pressed themselves into a tight line.  
  
Ken took a chance and put his hand on one of Omi's slumped shoulders. "I was really only in a bad mood. Things have been building up on me. It's not exactly easy living here without lights or heating or reliable hot water. It's enough to make anyone cranky after a while. I guess I just resent how well you seem to be coping with everything. It's enough to push anyone over the edge, and you were blithely unaffected by it all." He shrugged. "I've never laid claims to rational sensibilities or thought-out plans of action."  
  
"You are tired of me. That's the heart of the issue. Even Aya has noticed how you've been acting. I'm sorry if I'm not what you want anymore, but if you'll just tell me, I'll change. I can be what you want." Omi transferred his hands to Ken's forearm, trying to hold on in the only way he knew. "I wouldn't mind. I could change, for you I could change."  
  
Ken ran a shaky hand through his hair. Omi had brought up the topic himself. This was his chance. He could find some way to begin a gentle letdown, free himself of any obligations. End the relationship and make it seem to be less his fault.  
  
"Omi, sometimes you can be too perceptive." He stated, having a vague idea of where he could lead everything.  
  
"I'll stop then." Omi looked up, mouth still drawn, eyes full of unbearable hope. "Anything you want me to change; just tell me and I will." He clasped Ken's hand in his.  
  
Ken wet his lower lip and tried to recalibrate things. Omi wasn't cooperating, in fact was doing the opposite and refusing to see any sort of doomed inevitability. 'I can change', he'd said. You can't change your entire personality on a whim. What the fucking hell was he supposed to say to that? What do you tell someone who has just offered to sacrifice their individuality for you? Ken tried to reform his thoughts, made the mistake of looking at those miserable, too-old eyes. Nobody deserves to be alone.  
  
"It-it's not you. This damned house is just getting me down, eating up so much of my time and sanity. I need some change. You were partially right. I am getting tired of things, my surroundings. Not you. I miss our old work; I miss being an assassin, having an outlet for all this pent up energy. I even miss being a florist, with all the annoying teenaged girls that came with it. I need something to do other than endless house repairs."  
  
Omi shifted a bit closer. "We can't do anything as a team until-"  
  
"I know we can't fucking do anything until Aya's fucking leg has healed up." Ken forced himself to stop talking while he regrouped yet again. Still hadn't worn the anger down yet, it appeared.  
  
"I know how it has to be. Aya would feel useless if we went off without him, even if he were masterminding operations behind the scenes. If he suffers, we all suffer. That's how it goes."  
  
Ken looked over, "What's wrong now?" Omi glanced away, wringing his hands.  
  
"Nothing. I'm sorry." He hunched his shoulders up again.  
  
A slow exhalation of breath. Time for a decision. Should he stay or should he let the inevitable take control and be an asshole. Omi shivered next to him. Ken sighed again, put an arm around Omi.  
  
"Don't be sorry. I didn't mean to yell at you. Don't try to change for me. You're fine the way you are. Be yourself; I love you as you are." There was no going back now; Ken understood that. As the saying went, you win some, you lose some. Ken couldn't ever remember winning any.  
  
"Are you sure?" Omi tucked his head under Ken's chin, huddled against the outside chill of his body.  
  
"Yes." He wasn't sure at all. Lying never lead to anything good.  
  
"Oh! You've got splinters in your hand. Sit here, let me get the tweezers." Omi leaped off the bed, hastily rubbing his eyes. Ken closed his and wondered when he'd next be alone to berate himself for being an idiot.  
  
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Okay, you guys can probably expect a few annoyingly angsty chapter endings while I'm getting things set up. Fear not, Youji and Aya fans, they're in the next chapter. I'm going to be dividing things fairly equally between the two "happy" little couples. -laughs- Anyway, I'm baaaaaack! Yay! E-mail me at darkhunter@ijustdontcare.com or akainobaka@mchsi.com , or even better, leave me some spiffy feedback! -gives candy to all- 


	2. Chapter Two

I felt I should finish the second chapter and post the first and second chapters all at the same time, so people would see that it wasn't ALL about Ken and Omi. This also, is somewhat bleak, but HEY! I'm just setting things up here. Can't have a story without any problems. Who wants to read about happy people sitting around eating candy, getting drunk and being disgustingly wealthy!?  
  
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Youji wouldn't go so far as to refer to it as a companionable quiet. A wordless truce perhaps. Neither had anything to say to the other and both were comfortable with that stalemate. As comfortable as any two partially sane people could be, sitting side by side, watching a blank TV screen.  
  
"They're being awfully quite." Youji's voice grated across the silence. He couldn't help it. That noiseless ringing had finally started up in his ears. Everyone had a breaking point in most given situations, Youji's just happened to arrive a few minutes ahead of schedule.  
  
"And?" Aya lifted one shoulder.  
  
"And, what if something bad is happening? What if Ken has lost his mind and he's up there eating chunks of Omi's lifeless body, gnawing away at Omi's rubbery flesh."  
  
Another raised shoulder. "You do realize the likelihood of that happening faces the odds of zero in a googolplex."  
  
Youji laughed. "Googolplex. What the hell am I supposed to say in reply to any sentence featuring the word 'Googolplex'?"  
  
"You just suggested Ken might be upstairs eating someone's flesh..." Aya huffed, deciding he'd given all the response really required. He went back to his contemplation of the curvaceous, black television screen. Someday he planned on buying a television and taking it apart. It was a mystery what that dark glass concealed from the layman's eyes.  
  
"I'm going to check on them." Youji announced, five minutes later. He patted Aya on the head as he passed by. Aya decided to let it slide.  
  
The wooden boards were chilly underneath Youji's bare feet. Smooth, waxed floors lasted only partway down the final hallway upstairs, turning into rough, stripped floorboards. Aya had tried to get all of the flooring fixed up, but his leg hadn't held up to all the activity.  
  
Tapping fingertips on their shut door. "Any survivors?" He decided to take the light-hearted approach. If something truly wrong had happened, one of the two should have come stomping down the stairs some time ago. He hoped. It was too quite for any sort of make-up sex to be going on. That may or may not be a sign for the worst.  
  
"I can't hear you through the wood. Come in." Omi's voice hailed him from behind the gateway to what just might be hell.  
  
Somewhat reassured, Youji turned the doorknob, peering into the dim room. Omi was hunched over one of Ken's hands, both of them sitting on the unmade bed, cast into highly contrasted shadow and orange by the bedside oil lamps.  
  
"This might be an odd question, but what exactly ARE you doing?" Seeing no signs of lingering resentment, Youji plopped down on the bed, making himself comfortable.  
  
"You're shaking the bed. I'm trying to pick splinters out of Ken's hand." Omi blew mussed bangs out of his eyes with an upward puff of breath, smiling somewhat absently. A pause. "That should be the last of them." He untangled his legs from the upper layers of blankets and padded quietly into the bathroom after brushing a kiss across Ken's poor hand; rummaging around in the first-aid kit on the counter.  
  
Keeping on eye on the open bathroom door to his right, Youji leaned over. "Should I understand it that you were unable to come up with a adequate 'let's just be friends' speech?"  
  
Ken looked up; bit his lip. "Youji, I'm so fucked. I am SO fucked. This isn't how things were supposed to finish up." Youji had trouble hearing Ken's muted whisper. They both avoided eye contact as Omi bounced back to sit on the edge of the bed.  
  
"Well, I've got a certain someone downstairs who'll probably be wondering why I've been gone for so long." Youji offered the first excuse he could come up with. In all actuality, he supposed Aya was still in the exact same spot, contemplating the secret messages hidden inside the inert television. He got like that sometimes...  
  
Ken made a few discreet "save me, please" faces. Youji gave his shoulder a squeeze, tousled the kid's hair in passing and made his escape. Unhappy relationship-type situations that didn't involve him directly made him somewhat squeamish.  
  
Youji wished he had someone around he could make senseless bets with. Aya was still staring off into the distance, not a single hair had shifted to a different position. Twenty some minutes without moving. Damn, but he really could have had some fun with in-house bets like that.  
  
"You dead?" Youji poked Aya in the arm. He half expected Aya to tip over and lie motionless on his side. Instead Aya blinked and looked up.  
  
"Good news and bad news." Tucking hair behind his ears, Youji slumped down on the couch, leaning against Aya. "Good new: No bloodshed. I think Omi's happy again. Bad News: Steadily standing relationship. Ken's the opposite of happy." Youji waited for a reply, letting his bleary eyes close. "'M tired. How about you?"  
  
Aya abruptly stood up, putting Youji off balance as his support went out from under him. Amethyst eyes stared at him for a moment before looking away. Youji watched hindered, retreating legs from his upside-down vantage point on the couch. Not another one of these episodes. "Remind me to avoid moody people from now on." He smacked his forehead, talking to the air. "Well shit, if I wanted to do that, I'd have to up and move away."  
  
- - - -  
  
He was going to be crippled. No one had said anything to confirm this new belief of his, but as far as Aya was concerned, it was a certainty. His leg was never going to heal, as it should have. He'd be limping around for the rest of his life, like some sort of aged person. Useless. He might as well work on his fucking cooking skills while he was at it, because for all the good he'd be doing in a few months' time, he might as well be a goddamned housewife.  
  
There was no way in hell he'd ever be able to hurtle from one rooftop to another, chasing down a targeted criminal, no way he could leap back from a knife blade, come crashing down out of nowhere, a malevolent angel with a bloodthirsty blade.  
  
Lying on his side, legs curled up to his chest under the blankets, his muscles screamed out, asking for relief. Limited range of motion. Limited range of usefulness. There were so many things he couldn't do now. Useless. A waste of air, a waste of anyone's time.  
  
"I really don't need another bout of depression from you right now. Not if I have to be trying to keep Ken and Omi from spontaneously combusting at the same time." The mattress dipped down as Youji sat down cross-legged on his side of the bed. He placed his palm against Aya's curved spine. "I'm not going to get a reply out of you, am I?"  
  
Silence reigned once again. This time it wasn't a comfortable one of understanding and contentment. Youji took his hand back; remained staring at the red hair spread upon the sky blue pillow. "I don't really understand what the problem is. I have a few guesses, but I'm assuming you're not in the mood to talk and validate any of those.  
  
"One of my theories suggests you're perhaps feeling a little out of sorts. You should know that you're doing everything far outside your current range of capability. You're being BEYOND helpful, and that in itself is making your leg a bit slow to heal. Maybe you're also feeling cooped up, because we haven't been taking on any jobs, because we've all been a bit paranoid and inclined to stay close to home. If it would make you feel better, tomorrow we can go out and just hang around out there in the big world, maybe walk around a bit, to give your leg some exercise."  
  
Youji stopped. "You know, you could try fucking talking here. I'm more than willing to do everything within my power and then some to make you feel better, but I have to know what's needed here." He knew the likelihood of his actually being any help at all were slim to none. Only around Aya did he ever feel this inadequate, a separate, lesser being. He couldn't read minds, but maybe he should have been born with that ability. Then he wouldn't be letting one of the most important people in this life down. Day after day.  
  
'Why aren't I good enough?' He went to sleep most nights wondering that very thing. He could only laugh into the face of adversity for so long before adversity picked up its katana and threatened to main him with it. If humor wasn't a way of coping with things, if attempting to help didn't make things any better, what was left? What could he honestly do, to make things better?  
  
He curled his body against Aya's, chest to back. It was like lying with a corpse. Barely noticeable breaths, motionless, emotionless, noiseless. "Aya, I'd do anything you wanted, but I have to know what you want first. I can't- I'm not good at reading people. I have to be told what to do. Hell, I can't even buy birthday gifts without a list to pick items from."  
  
There was a shifting of limbs as Aya pulled away, moving to the very edge of the bed. "I'm tired." He pulled his appendages in closer, going into as small a ball as he could.  
  
Flipping onto his back, Youji wondered what his new sin might be. Had he said something wrong without meaning to, had he made the wrong facial expression at the wrong time? Had he been faulted for not having a limp of his own? What had shifted, to put him in the eternal role of wrongdoer this time?  
  
Maybe, someone could tell him when he was at least doing the right thing. Nothing ever came through about blatant mistakes, could he at least expect a quick word of affirmation if he ever happened to do something correctly?  
  
"What's wrong with me now, Aya? I do my best, but I can still only be this one person. Myself." There was no reply. This time he didn't even bother to hope for one.  
  
On the other half of the bed, Aya wondered why no one could understand. Why no one would even speak the truth with him. Loosing his livelihood, his only known method of living, and people were suggesting a nice walk might make him feel better. What was he doing wrong, that no one could understand he just wanted some time alone?  
  
"Good night, Aya." Youji watched the moon paint shifting skeleton hands across the ceiling, the branches outside dancing in unison with the shadows on the bumpy plaster.  
  
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Doesn't that just make you all warm and fuzzy, boys and girls? -laughs some more- I'm not into angst, but things are more fun when everyone is just plain old unhappy. They really are! Anyway, you like the new installments? You hate? Let me know! E-mail me at darkhunter@ijustdontcare or akainobaka@mchsi.com 


	3. Chapter Three

ARG! Sorry about the delay here! I was busy moving, and now that I'm finally moved in I have NO JOB! Usually, that would equate more free time, but I'm sort of needing one, so a great deal of effort goes into finding a new one. That and my boyfriend has that Black and White game. -sighs- It's too goddamned addictive, I missed this thing when I wasn't living with him. Okay-dokay. Here we go again!  
  
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Once again, it was shaping up to be one of those days. Omi could taste the anger in the air, breezing in from all directions. Or maybe that was just the memory of traces of blood on his tongue from the night before. Things weren't as pleasant as he'd like to pretend they were.  
  
He brushed sticky bangs out of his face with the only clean bit of his forearm left. Today was his day for a turn in the kitchen. Somehow or another, every other bit had been cleaned and patched excepting the most disgusting bits. Those apparently had been left for him. The absolutely vile cabinets watched him, leering beneath their thick coverage of insect feces and the caked on grunge of ages. Just his luck, there hadn't been any of the elbow-high rubber gloves left today, all claimed by someone less in need of them than he. The only remaining pair available for his usage had enough holes in it too strain soup with. You'd never want to put something EDIBLE through those tattered, grimy hand sheaths, but it was the concept, the concept he was getting at. Something he couldn't get anyone else to grasp a great deal of the time.  
  
One of his knuckles brushed against the filthy cupboard's inner walls, a streak of unidentifiable muck left across the back of his hand. Gods, who the fuck knew what sorts of nasty, horrible shit it contained! He threw the sponge to the ground and stomped up and down on it, went to run his hands under scalding hot water again. Those damned tears were back, prickling beneath his closed eyelids. None of this was worth bawling about, wailing like some sort of stupid woman.  
  
It wasn't as if he hadn't been issued an apology in the morning. It's not like they hadn't had bouts of rough sex before. Not after a fight though. That in itself scared him. Ken wasn't supposed to scare him. That was the whole point of being in love with someone. Ken was supposed to be the one safe person left at the end of a day full of enemies and brushes with death and random frightening things. He wasn't supposed to be upset about that. He felt like crying because he was mad about having to clean those filthy cabinets. That had to be it.  
  
If Omi wanted to, he could push up his sleeve and look at the hand shaped bruises wringing his upper arms, brands of ownership on his shoulders, more on his hips. Teeth imprints even, if he could actually crane his head about to such an angle that they'd be visible. If he actually wanted to look at them and be reminded again, that is. And damn it all if those tears hadn't just escaped from his eyes.  
  
"You crying?"  
  
Omi tried not to choke on his heart as it made a frenzied leap up into his throat. He whirled around to face the unexpected interloper.  
  
"Ken! No, I'm not crying." He immediately denied it as he scrubbed hastily at the tears he knew had to be visible on his cheeks. "What are you doing here? I thought you were out nailing on new siding." He hands felt uncomfortably hot and rough against his face, still heated from the water.  
  
"I sorta smashed my thumb with a hammer." Ken held up his hand, already a distinct purplish-blue color. "That can wait though. What's wrong?" That old concern was back, the kind that actually seemed genuine instead of carefully constructed and false.  
  
Sniffing, Omi switched the water over to cold, something they at least had in ready supply in this house. "Put your hand under the tap for a few minutes, get the dirt off your skin too, so I can see how badly it's damaged." He left the room, not so much as to do something productive, but as a chance for the blotchy redness to fade from his face, a chance for the hem of his shirt to absorb the last of the tears, a chance to calm down.  
  
When he returned a few moments, later, Ken was holding his hand up in front of his face. "I can twitch my thumb." He announced. "I'm sure when it's slightly less painful, not to mention swollen, I'll have my full range of motion back. I guess I just smashed up some non-lethal tissue cells." He turned, arm twisted behind him so he could put it back under the faucet.  
  
"Are you okay?" Ken leans back against the counter.  
  
"Shouldn't I be asking you the same thing? Do you want me to take over for you for a bit while the swelling goes down?" Omi refused the uninjured, proffered hand, not quite ready to resume casual physical contact for a few more minutes.  
  
"You're certainly jumpy today. What's wrong?" Ken restated his previous question, ignoring Omi's offer to switch places.  
  
"Nothing. Nothing at all. Just would have preferred to have been saddled with other activities for today." He retrieved the sponge from the floor, setting it on the edge of the sink.  
  
"You're still mad about last night." It wasn't presented in the form of a question.  
  
Omi looked away. "'M not mad at all. I'll be in the living room. Let me know when you're done with the sink, so I can go back to cleaning." He made his escape before things could start up again.  
  
Youji was already occupying the couch.  
  
"Aren't you supposed to be doing something constructive right now?" Omi snapped.  
  
"Nothing in particular comes to mind. I'm taking a nice little break. Why? Do you need the couch in the worst sort of way?" Youji shifted his legs off the adjoining cushions so he only took up one seat. "I'd be willing to share, but there's no way in hell you're dragging me into an upright position for at least ten more minutes."  
  
Sighing, Omi flumped down on the two remaining seat cushions.  
  
"Who's hogging the couch now?" Youji poked him in the side, startling a surprised giggle out of Omi.  
  
He pushed Youji away. "Stop that." The sudden grin faded.  
  
"Gods! Not you too now? Can't anyone be happy around this damned house! You're all conspiring to make me a chronic depression case, aren't you? You all resent me because I'm in a good mood, don't you?" Youji feigned indignation. "Hey, aren't you supposed to be, you know, cleaning things in the kitchen? Or something like that?"  
  
"Ken's using the sink right now."  
  
"What is he 'using' the sink for?" Youji tried to assuage his ennui while the opportunity presented itself. At least Omi would still speak in complete sentences. Not that he was bitter...  
  
"He hit his thumb with a hammer and- hey! Why is that funny?" Omi frowned.  
  
Gasping for breath, Youji shook his head. "He smashed up his thumb with a hammer! How is that not funny? I wish I could have seen the look on his face as he realized he'd missed the nail."  
  
"You've got a very bizarre sense of humor." Omi crossed his arms, slouching down.  
  
"Why aren't you happy? Is there really some sort of conspiracy between you all? Ken would have had to think it up, of course, because you're not that mean, and Aya wouldn't conspire with anyone unless he felt it absolutely and irrevocably necessary." Youji rambled on, attempting to bring cheer and amusement in the only way he was really capable of doing so.  
  
"What are you supposed to be up to today?" Omi looked up from underneath his bangs. "Whatever it is, I'll not only trade you, but I'll also take over your cooking nights for the next two weeks."  
  
"Let me guess, you're the one who got stuck doing the kitchen cabinets? I wondered who'd have to actually touch that foul mess. You'd have to take over a hell of a lot more than two weeks to get me to even look at that nasty crap." He crossed his arms behind his head, taking on a carefully manufactured pose of insouciance. "Unless, of course, you're willing to make a bigger trade?"  
  
"Will it degrade me and cause me to put aside my basic human dignities?"  
  
Youji scratched his head. "I don't think so."  
  
"I'm all for it then, as long as I don't have to go back into that kitchen and pick up the sponge again!"  
  
"I'm supposed to go out in the cold and rake up all those damp, cold, heavy masses of leaves and wrestle them into compost bags for a start. Pointless physical labor disagrees with me. Also supposed to set up more appointments for various electricians to look at our wiring again. You can do all those, and my dish washing and my cooking for the next three and a half weeks."  
  
"Is that all?" Omi stuck his hand in Youji's face. "Let's shake on it and call it a done deal."  
  
Not even waiting for any further conversation, Omi headed for the cold out of doors, ready to be anywhere cleaning. He found a somewhat decrepit rake lying on the ground next to a bag of yard waste bags. A little further along, there was a pile of leaves with a Youji-shaped indent in the whole sodden pile surrounded by hastily kicked up foliage. He guessed Youji found out the fun way that damp leaves aren't very comfortable; worm ridden is more like it. If any worms even survived the cold. It was the concept that counted...  
  
In the background the sporadic pounding started up again as Ken went back to nailing down siding in total disregard for his already once maimed thumb. Omi tried not to internally cringe every time he heard the final large smash. It was a tad disconcerting, to imagine having to watch that happen to your own hand. Painful to think about.  
  
Omi looked at the upright yard waste bag, looked at the damp pile of leaves. He wondered if he was supposed to use the rake like a shovel, scoop up the leaves and dump them into the bag. "Stop falling off!" It was never a good sign, to find yourself shouting at leaves, but they simply wouldn't stay on the rake.  
  
"Turn the bag on its side and push the leaves into it." Ken took the rake from him to demonstrate.  
  
Omi had another one of those 'ready to swallow his tongue out of complete and utter shock' moments. "Why must you always sneak up behind me like that?" He realized belatedly that he hadn't actually heard any hammering for a while now; Ken had probably been standing there the whole time, watching him make an idiot of himself.  
  
"Look, just push the leaves into the bag. Like this." Ken demonstrated, using his most patient voice.  
  
Frowning, Omi took the rake back. "I'm not stupid. I've just never done this before. It's not as if we've ever lived somewhere with trees before." He threw himself into it, hoping Ken would go away.  
  
Ken didn't. Not immediately, that is. He stood around for a few minutes, looking puzzled before going back to the house, picking up more siding from the stack on the lawn as he went.  
  
* * * * * * * * * * * * * *  
  
Yes, nothing much happened. I know that! I did write it after all ^_-. Things are still being set up. Give me a break! Fanfictions are there so you don't HAVE to have a real plot beforehand. You know the drill, so e-mail me already! akainobaka@mchsi.com or darkhunter@ijustdontcare.com 


	4. Chapter Four

In the following chapter, you should be aware that things happen. Many things. Uh-happening things. Yup. Goddamnit! Just read the damned thing!  
  
**************  
  
The music pulsed around him like some formless, living thing, trying to draw him in with its rhythmic heartbeat. He chose to ignore it. He had better things to do. Getting piss drunk took effort, damn it.  
  
"Hey, lovely, why aren't you out dancing?" A slim arm was snaked around his neck, accompanied by a wave of choking perfume.  
  
Youji glanced over his shoulder, wound up spluttering around a mouthful of long, platinum blonde hair. Upon blowing the hair out of his airway he found himself eye level with a pair of bright blue breasts. The breasts weren't literally blue, merely the shirt. A month or two ago, this wouldn't be a bad place to find himself, staring down some sapphire blue breasts. Right now, in the middle of a serious guilt trip, status: not welcome.  
  
"I'm busy with a solely self-inclusive pity party right now." He hoped she'd take a hint and bugger off to hang all over someone else.  
  
"I always thought it took two to party." She decided the angle at which she thrust her cleavage at him must not have been doing the trick. "I'm always ready to party, baby."  
  
Youji wondered if she could sound anymore like a B movie. He was willing to bet she could. "Not to belittle you, but I'm quite content to sit here by myself." A not so subtle dismissal. Would she accept it and go? Of course not.  
  
Time for a girlish little pout from her direction.  
  
"Would it help if I told you I was gay?" He sighed tiredly, swirling ice around in the now empty glass. That certainly wasn't an excuse he'd stooped to before, but then again, he was usually trying to reel easy lays in, not beat them off with a stick.  
  
Bosomy girl gave a few startled gasps. "Oh! I never would have guessed. Sorry!" She managed to sound more surprised than miffed. She was still annoying and he couldn't have been any more pleased when she walked away.  
  
He was supposed to be visiting a dead girl right now. Well, not literally dead. She was in a coma. He was supposed to sit there and listen to the whirring of life-support machinery and perhaps read a book at her, carry out a one-sided conversation. In the end he hadn't had a choice on the leaving the house matter. It was better to lie and have Aya back in a sociable mood than to stick to his guns and right out refuse to pay dear old Aya-chan a visit. That would lead to a small-scale massacre within the confines of their home.  
  
Aya, the conscious Aya, Ran, had explained something along the lines of his not feeling worthy of visiting her in his 'crippled' state. Youji couldn't figure out if he was just having some sort of womanish fit and trying to get some sympathy or if he had really convinced himself that he was going to limp for the rest of his life. He was guessing it was the latter of the two options.  
  
"You want another drink?" Another buxom blond in his face; only the bartender this time. "If that's a no, you do need to make room, buddy. You're taking up space a paying customer could occupy." He threw down more money and told her to keep it coming. She readily obliged, it being her job and all.  
  
It wasn't even a fair demand, or a rational one, telling Youji that he had to go visit some lifeless body in its brother's stead. This was yet another time when he wished painful deaths on all fucked-up people. Specifically, the fucked-up people he dated.  
  
He'd made it halfway to the hospital, realized he honestly didn't feel like going through with it, turned around and headed somewhere he could get drunk. He hadn't wanted to head back to his old haunts, it would be too much like showing up again and saying 'Guess what, I'm a depressed loser again! Welcome me with wide-open arms!' Then all his middle-aged ex-cohorts could get up and douse him with bad beer and they could all get down to the serious business of being worthless drunks.  
  
Time passed at a crawl. Every few minutes he'd glance at his watch, expecting hours to have passed. He'd decided to stay away for a set time limit. He couldn't return home until nine. Hospital visiting hours ended at six, but Ran would expect him to be his usual crafty self and stay long after, escaping detection by all.  
  
'How are you going to explain being drunk?' The voice of reason started nagging him in the back of his skull. It sounded annoyingly like Ran. 'You're not supposed to call him that', the voice reminded him. "Unless we're fucking." Youji realized a few moments to late that he was now replying out-loud to the voice in his head. The few people close enough to have heard him were pointedly ignoring him. Insanity might be catching.  
  
Another hour crawled by, another long, slow, agonizing hour. Youji gave up and returned for home an entire half an hour early. He'd think up a plausible explanation for his inebriated state when the time came. The only time he generated originality was when he was on the spot.  
  
Youji had mastered the art of driving-drunk a long while ago. He'd yet to get a ticket for being an alcohol-sodden idiot behind the wheel of a vehicle. There were a few jammed in the dashboard concerning some of his excessive speeding, but none for DWI. Go him.  
  
The other car was gone from the creepy old garage. The only significance there was the fact that if Aya wound up killing him in a fit of rage, it would be easier for him to hide Youij's body without any witnesses. No lights at all. The house might as well be empty. Maybe it was. Soft footsteps were necessary.  
  
"You reek of alcohol." The sneer was obvious in Aya's voice.  
  
"You try sitting in a room with a body for a few hours, see how long staying-sober sounds good to you." Youji gave himself a mental pat on the back. That was smooth, real smooth. Sounded like him, irrepressibly irresponsible to a T.  
  
"How did she look?" Aya appeared to have bought it, but with Aya you never knew, he could be a sneaky little son of a bitch.  
  
"She looked very, asleep." Youji changed his mind. Mixing drunkenness with a general need for intelligence never went well. "She did a hell of a lot of breathing too, that was good. She's not much of a talker; further proof you and she are related." Yup, drunk and intelligent were passing acquaintances at best.  
  
"You turn everything into a joke." Aya switched on a table light, turning the living room into shadowed grounds for a confrontation.  
  
"You turn everything into a fucking dirge. All I ever hear from you is a steady mantra of 'poor me, poor us, poor me, my life sucks and everyone is at fault.' Can't you ever thing anything cheerful or worthwhile? Why am I always the one who has to give in on issues and stop being mad so you can be right? You're not always right! Even you, Mr. Gimpy the Wonder Prick, can occasionally make mistakes." He stomped his foot at the end of his speech. It seemed like a fitting emphasis. It made his perception of the surrounding world spin like a top. Alcohol, can't live with it, can't get suitably intoxicated without it.  
  
"You're so drunk you don't even know what you're saying." Aya was obviously trying not to get angry. "What next, are you going to take up smoking again? Should I slap some caulking on all those leaks to hold them off for a week or two and set up shop for you in the broken bedroom? Save us all some trouble?"  
  
Youji did get angry. He found it was becoming an easier and easier emotion to attain. Gritting his teeth against the words trying to flood out of his mouth, against the anger gripping his chest like a restraining force, Youji did the only thing he thought wise. He left. Got back in the car, drove off into the night.  
  
No attention was paid to his destination, his hands steered and his eyes watched for other cars and speed limits. After a while he realized his surroundings were familiar. He was heading back to the hospital. Out in the middle of nowhere, an odd location for a hospital. An odd location to become his objective.  
  
Youji parked the car, opened the trunk. There was a handy little kit hidden underneath the carpet in the trunk. He was rarely issued memos letting him know on what given day he'd need scaling equipment so he just made sure he had the proper equipment with him at all times. He knew he must be completely out of it, thinking about breaking into a hospital. No, not thinking about it, planning it and getting ready to go through with it.  
  
He hadn't even come up with a reason for his decision. 'Because you're going to try and make up for having lied.' The voice in his head told him. 'An atonement. You'll hang out with the dead girl for a few hours and you'll feel better about not having done so in the first place.' Youji decided he was glad the voice in the back of his head only showed up when he was inebriated AND faced with serious moral dilemmas.  
  
It was a simple matter to fish around in his memories and determine which window was hers. Even easier to send up a grappling hook. He loved technology and all its useful advantages. Only technology would come up with a grappling hook that would actually meld with the surface it connected with. Natural skills had him up and on that precarious ledge in a matter of minutes. It was only the seventh floor, either way.  
  
Instant warm air as he opened the window. It wasn't locked. It was on the seventh floor, why would it be locked. Excepting Youji himself, very few people had any evil designs involving an illicit trip to the hospital via an upper-story window. The light was on, he realized as he silently pushed the curtain aside. For a moment he tried to quickly come up with a proper response if he'd somehow deposited himself in the wrong room. A false alarm. Just that lone figure lying in bed, surrounded by machines that seemed more alive than she did.  
  
"Hello, Aya." He whispered, unnerved by her lack of motion. People who didn't move or speak for long periods of time were supposed to be dead by default, but there she was, her chest rising and falling. He wondered what he would do if her eyes suddenly opened. He supposed the proper reaction would be one of amazed joy, because Ay-no, Ran's beloved sister had returned to the land of the living. He supposed his real reaction would be a few shocked expressions conveying nothing but horror and a hasty retreat back out the window. It would just be fucking creepy, truth be told.  
  
"I'm Youji." He kept it down, feeling ridiculous and certainly not wanting to attract attention. "I'm a... friend of your brother's. Ran. I came to see you because he can't right now. Well, actually he's just being a stubborn little asshole." He laughed nervously. "Mind if I take a seat, young lady?" He noiselessly drew over a chair.  
  
She had nothing to say in reply. Really not much of a conversationalist at all, as Youji had previously noted. "You used to know him, probably knew him better then than I'll ever know him. What am I supposed to do? I do my damndest to make sure things go his way, he really is important to me; I don't think I would have gotten through a lot of things without his help. Wouldn't have wound up as arguably sane as I am now, at least. What is it he expects in return? Am I supposed to perform miracles and walk on water? Hell, you're all but dead and you probably have more to say about your wants and needs than he does. Tell me then, what am I supposed to do?"  
  
He sat there for hours, talking to her lifeless form, not expecting an answer, merely working things out for himself. When he heard the morning nurses beginning to make their rounds, he slipped back out the window, detached the climb line and drove himself home, a hell of a lot more sober than he had been.  
  
The other car was back in the garage. He wearily headed for the living room, prepared to catch a few hours of sleep on the couch before the morning bustle of the others woke him up. The couch was already taken up by a dozing Aya. His eyes snapped open as Youji's foot inadvertently came down on a creaking floorboard. For a moment he was startled, defensive; in that state of waking where nothing is certain and everything is an enemy until proven otherwise.  
  
"When did you get back?" He sat up, rubbing at his eyes, ignoring the coat Youji still had on, other signs of his recent arrival.  
  
"Few minutes ago."  
  
Aya stood up, walked towards Youji. Youji expected a big 'Welcome Home' punch, stood still and got ready to take it like a man. Instead Aya paused for a moment, working out something only he would probably ever comprehend. Then his arms came up and he pulled Youji into a rough hug.  
  
"I was starting to worry about you." He said softly. "I wait up most of the night and you don't even have a ready explanation for where the hell you've been." Aya didn't sound like he really minded the last one.  
  
"I was chatting with that dead sister of yours." Youji rested head against Aya's, eyes closed.  
  
Aya gave that some more thought, considered contesting Youji's description of his sole living relative again and decided to leave that for another morning. "What did she have to say?" The corner of his mouth twitched up, the closest he'd ever get to making a joke about the issue that had forced his hand in the shaping of this life he now led.  
  
"Not much. I'm tired. I don't know if you got much napping done down here, but I wouldn't mind a morning in bed." It was the closest Youji would come to offering an olive branch in response to Aya's slight hint of lightening up.  
  
"Bed sounds good." They headed up the stairs, shut out as much of the rising sun's light as they could with the curtains and fell asleep facing each other for the first time in weeks.   
  
**************  
  
Don't ask me where I'm going with these two! While they are both half of this fanfiction, I mainly started this sequel up so I could do twisted things to Ken and Omi. Hehe, for Aya and Youji I have to invent the plot chapter by chapter. Poor them. Anyway, I'll get to work on the next installment as soon as I can. Until then, give me cookies! I'd certainly appreciate feedback or e-mails! You can reach me at darkhunter@ijustdontcare.com or akainobaka@mchsi.com ! 


	5. Chapter Five

So, the plots taking a while to pick up. All the more room for angst, and for my inherent laziness to work its magic! Updates should be coming fairly steadily for a while, seeing as I'm STILLLKLLLL LKSDHFC:ODHVN:ODIVHN:SOIF FRICKIN UNEMPLOYED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! -stabs in a fit of fury until the rage subsides- Okay, better now. Waaaaahhhh, I miss money!!! Oh well, less work, more productivity. It's even cooler because I don't really sleep anymore! Woot for productivity!  
  
**************  
  
She must have been one of the disbanded fanclub members. She followed him with this puzzled look, recognition just a footstep away, almost sure of his identity. She would have gone unnoticed if her target had been someone other than Ken. It was hard to catch an assassin unawares. Even in the sterile, brightly lit aisles of a grocery store, one had to be on one's guard.  
  
Ken wondered how nearby employees would react if he threw the half-gallon container of ice cream at the girl's head and ran. Probably negatively. It would be absolute hell of she was one of their ex-groupies and she somehow or another found out where they were all holed up. It would be a wrenching farewell to peace and quite.  
  
He slowed, left his cart near the end of the pasta aisle and deliberately knocked over a pyramid of tomato sauce cans, making it look as much like an accident as possible. If given the chance, his rotten luck would have knocked it down at a later date anyway. Little maroon shirted employees scurried from all sides; he disappeared into the early evening crowd, circling around to the front of the store, sneaking up behind the dark haired girl. She was scanning the crowd, completely unaware of his new location.  
  
"How long did you plan on following me?" Ken struck a careless pose, hiding an unpleasant smirk as the girl whirled around, eyes huge.  
  
"Where the fuck did you come from!?" She gasped, "Oops!" Her face flushed, one of those annoyingly attractive blushers. "Where did you come from?" She rephrased her original question. Ken found himself disliking her a tad less for her bluntness and her use of profanity.  
  
"That question could be interpreted in any number of ways. Why have you been following me?"  
  
She flushed again, giving him an embarrassed grin. "I was trying to figure out where I knew you from."  
  
"Last name's Hidaka, first name's Ken. Burnt down flower shop. Ring any bells?" He told her the truth out of sheer perverseness.   
  
The girl shook her head. "Actually, you nudged my faulty memory when you snuck up on me like that." She grinned. "My last name's Rinjin, first name's Kakaria. Related to a crazy old woman who wants to marry off all her living female relatives. Ring any bells."  
  
"Rinjin?" Ken squinched up his eyes, mentally going through the hanging filefolders. "You're related to that crazy old bit-I mean Mrs. Rinjin, my neighbor."  
  
Kakaria threw her head back and laughed. "My grandmother IS a crazy old bitch, but in a frighteningly humorous sort of way." Ken was abruptly hauled into a enthusiastic handshake. "Sorry about the stalking thing, I just could not for the life of me figure out who you were! I probably recognized you from one of your many house fixing ventures out of doors. I try to visit my grandmother once or twice a week, she gets lonely in that big house all by herself."  
  
A few moments of silence as all the readily available conversation topics had been exhausted. Ken rubbed at the back of his head. "Well, I've got three more hungry people waiting for me to get home with groceries. It was nice bumping into you here. We should get together sometimes, discuss false marriage plans in front of your grandmother for our own twisted amusement."  
  
"Or we could go out for coffee in the near future."  
  
She smiled, conveying some nameless quality Ken felt he'd been searching for most of his life. He smiled back. "Sounds like a plan. How about tomorrow when we're not bogged down with frozen foods?"  
  
"Five o' clock, the coffee shop down in the east business district, the one on Blecker Street." She extended her hand again; Ken shook, smiled in a most idiotic fashion and forced himself to let go of her hand.  
  
"Let's bump that back another hour, to avoid the evening rush. Six?"  
  
"It's a date!" Kakaria made a fist and mock-punched Ken's arm. He wandered back to the mostly forgotten scene of disaster, retrieved his cart and maneuvered around the dented tin cans he'd knocked to the floor earlier.   
  
The guilt didn't hit until he was in the checkout line. He created a mental conversation for his own benefit. 'Yeah Omi, I'll be out for about an hour, the neighbor's granddaughter and I are going out on a quick date, do you want me to pick anything up for you while I'm out?' Shit. What was he thinking?  
  
Thinking with his cock, really. Only excuse a male really had when it came down to it. A valid excuse at least. He'd admit that he certainly had found her attractive, worthy of lust, definitely. A certain strength of character not usually found in those of the female persuasion. Unabashed. That was the word for it. She'd blush when she got caught doing something silly, but still admit it and be not the slightest bit repentant.  
  
"Paper or plastic?" Snapped the checkout girl. Judging by her less than patient tone, Ken was willing to hazard that he'd probably been asked that same question several times over.  
  
"Plastic will be fine." He put down money on the counter, not paying attention to the change he received. Ken was fairly certain he'd just made yet another one of those incredibly stupid decisions. Joy.  
  
The question now was 'What to do?' He didn't know where Kakaria lived, didn't want to try and reach her through his neighbor. Old Mrs. Rinjin really was quite scary. Not in a humorous way at all. She'd trapped him once, in his own kitchen, told him stories about her many wonderful, unmarried descendents, trying to interest him in any of them. For several hours.  
  
Shit, he honestly wanted to go though. He'd also promised Omi that he'd try to be a better person, try to stop being such a jerk. Going on dates with other people probably fell well into the category of 'Jerk'.  
  
Ken loaded all the grocery bags into the trunk, drove towards the mall. Not somewhere he'd go on purpose. He'd dropped Omi off an hour earlier so he could find some piece of software or another. Hopefully Omi hadn't gone wandering too far, or the frozen food in the trunk would suffer. In the back of his mind he noted that the temperature outside would actually be sufficient to preserve the food for a while, but that point could be ignored for the sake of argument.  
  
He kept his head down, tried not to brush against anyone. It wasn't a day for getting trapped with some random being who wanted to make small talk with him. His own worries and thoughts were enough for now. Would he ever wind up doing the right thing at the right time?  
  
No Omi in the first software store he peeped into; lots of enthusiastic, bespeckled, gawkish looking teenagers, but no Omi. "You see a short blond kid, about yea tall, he was wearing a dark blue jacket?" Ken tracked down one of the employees.  
  
"Yeah, he left a while ago though. Didn't even wait for his change, seemed to be in a big hurry."  
  
Ken frowned. "Which way did he go? Did he say where he was heading off to?"  
  
"He just grabbed his bag and dashed off. It's a weekend, man; he just disappeared into the crowd. I'd be willing to guess he headed right though, not much the other way, just the exit."  
  
A deep sigh and he was off again. There went the ice cream... He couldn't avoid acknowledging people by this point. It was hard to find someone if you were concentrating wholly on your shoelaces. It wasn't as if Omi blended into a crowd when you really looked, not too many blondes in Japan, more so than usual in the younger crowds, but few of those natural.  
  
He barely saw the crowd parting before a small body all but knocked Ken over backwards. He readied himself for the battle it would take to keep from becoming frighteningly angry with someone's ill behaved child. He frowned down, holding his assailant away from him; he was greeted by a familiar pair of blue eyes.  
  
"Where have you been, I've been looking for you?" Ken grumbled, steadying an off balance Omi.  
  
Omi was out of breath, trying to gasp something out. "We... we have-have to get out of here. Now!" He put a hand to his heaving chest. "Now." He repeated himself.  
  
"I'd say so! I've got a trunk full of food trying to melt into a useless pile. That's a blatant waste of money. Let's get going."  
  
"Ken I saw-"  
  
"Talk in the car, we need to get headed home, the mall's going to close in a manner of minutes and as I said, the food is calling." He grabbed Omi's upper arm and started to drag him towards the entrance.  
  
"Not this way! NOT this way!" Omi pulled back, wrenching his arm out of Ken's grasp, eyes a tad wild. Ken realized with a twinge of annoyance that they were officially making a scene.  
  
"Fine. I'm not going to turn us into some sort of entertainment spectacle. You want to go out another door and walk in the cold for a few more minutes, fine!"  
  
"The groceries won't melt if it's that cold." Omi pointed out, the voice of reason, as he hurried after an irate Ken.  
  
"Oh, shut up." Ken slowed it down a notch, arms at his side in that aggressive manner he was employing more and more as the days wore on. He refused to speak, stomping along at the fastest pace he knew Omi would be able to keep up with. Omi, still out of breath from running around held his tongue. If it got him out of here in good time, nothing else was important. He could explain when they were safe in the car.  
  
The door opened to the dark winter sky and the crowded parking lot.  
  
"Slow down Ken! I can't keep up!" Omi dashed a few steps, clung to Ken's hand. "Please wait for me! We have to talk now, it's important." He knew he was starting to sound a bit pathetic, but he didn't like being left behind, it made him feel forgotten. Nobody likes to be abandoned, not even in a chilly mall parking lot.  
  
Ken shook him off like an unexpected insect alighting on his sleeve. For one blinding instant, he wanted it to be anyone BUT Omi at his arm, anyone, first choice would be the lovely Kakaria, but if not her, ANYONE. He looked over his shoulder, saw Omi standing there, head drooping, perfectly illuminated by one of the lots street lights. He looked like nothing more than a discarded toy; something used up and left in the owner's ever distancing wake.  
  
He turned, the guilt back to the point where it almost hurt to breathe. It was like shouting at an abused child, just so it would be submissive and quick-to-please when you stopped being mad at it and turned around to give it a reassuring pat on the head. A few steps, a pair of arms acting independently of his body, that shivering body folding into his.  
  
"I'm doing it again. I'm sorry. You've probably got a perfectly reasonable explanation for all of this. You don't do irrational things like I do. I'm sorry." More worthless apologies.  
  
"Quite right. He did have a perfectly reasonable explanation, and if you'd listened to him from the start, none of this would have to happen. What a cute little tableau. I almost feel guilty coming to kill you. Illogical, though, seeing as I'm merely repaying a debt."  
  
Ken and Omi both made an involuntary jump back as a man all but materialized out of thin air.  
  
"You see, I was waiting by the entrance you'd both come in through, if you hadn't put up such a fuss, you might have made a clean get away. Too bad. I was so looking forward to another bonfire." The man smiled, teeth gleaming, the only white thing about him as he stood outside the circle of the lamp's casting.  
  
Ken frowned, trying to pick out distinguishing characteristics. That voice was vaguely familiar. Someone he'd tried to kill?  
  
Purposeful footsteps as he stopped forward, trench coat flapping around his ankles, expensive suit matching his expensive looking face, country club facial features. A sudden flash through Ken's mind. That same mocking grin speeding past with the superimposed image of Ken's fist. A blood strewn office building, twenty-seven floors of human slaughter; caused by him, by Aya, and by Omi.  
  
"I killed you." There was no room for question in Ken's voice. "I killed you. Even if I hadn't smashed your brain into pulp, you wouldn't look like that. You can't be. You are dead. I killed you." The man had to be dead. He'd killed him, killed all of his cronies. Twenty seven floors of them. They had to die, they'd kidnapped Youji, given him horrible nightmares they all woke up hearing the shouting from.  
  
"You'll find I, much like my comrades, am not that easy to kill. Ko-ishi was largely annoyed by your show of ingratitude. He spared your lives when he razed your house. One good turn deserves another most men say. We will show you no leniency from now."  
  
Omi gasped, taking another step back as the man's identity finally sank in. "You were all dead. We searched for survivors." Ken's arm was a matter of inches away, but the gap may as well have been a mile. Omi would find no protection from those quarters. He pushed out his chin, falling back on old patterns. When one is trapped between a rock and an uncaring space, all you have is yourself.  
  
"So, you're back from the dead, zombies of the night, inhuman beings." Omi snorted, voice sounding more slipshod and amused to his ears than the actual emotions he harbored. "Blah, blah, blah. So, you've made your dramatic entrance, what now? Are you going to 'slay' us? Give us a taste of your wrath?" He curled his hands into fists, braced muscles for a sudden surge of movement. He was better with physical confrontations then he was with emotional ones, this was a safe old ground.  
  
He moved so fast neither Ken nor Omi saw him coming in time. A few well placed elbow jabs and flailing feet and both wound up sprawled on the ground, entire feet away from their original starting positions. Omi pushed himself up, well and truly angry now. Rushing adrenaline, narrowed down focus, that inhuman surge of absolute rage. It felt decidedly nice. Maybe he could sympathize with Ken's temper after all.  
  
Skinned elbows, exposed through torn jacket sleeves were nothing but a minute nagging. Even as his hands grasped for his weapon of choice, part of him was noting that he was unarmed. Time to put those years of training to use. While Ken was still looking stunned and surprised, Omi was forming fists and launching himself straight at their attacker. "I'm going to knock you back into the afterlife."  
  
He didn't share Ken's belief that this was in fact the same man he'd originally seen, but if that was what Mr. Anonymous wanted to pretend, he'd be perfectly willing to come up with one-liners revolving around that assumption. Omi's fist swung into a perfect right hook, spreading the newly christened Mr. Anonymous's lips out across his teeth.  
  
"You little bastard." He spit blood out, lips definitely mangled, his foot lashing out and catching Omi by the throat, actually picking the boy up and throwing him into the lamppost. Ken was on him in an instant, fists pummeling with that same shared rage, fueled by a protective spark this time.  
  
Quarters were close and neither had much maneuvering room. Ken realized after a matter of moments that he was going to be the underdog of this fight; he was at a disadvantage concerning muscle weight and simple hand-to-hand combat skills. His weapons or perhaps a gun would be rather helpful right now.  
  
"He's dead, now it's your turn. Your friends will roast as they sleep." He smiled in Ken's face, teeth a particularly gruesome shade of dirty pink from the blood filling his mouth. He kicked Ken's legs out from underneath him. As Kens' head cracked against the asphalt he caught of glimpse of Omi slumped against the light's pole, blood in his face, limbs loose, officially doll-like, and lifeless.  
  
He'd fucked up yet again, for the umpteenth time this day. He should have been protecting Omi; Omi deserved that, just for sticking with him for all this time and putting up with endless rages like a saint. Blood ran down from Omi's hair, a trail of red making war paint patterns on his shadowed features, pooling in all available hollows. He didn't move, not even to breath.  
  
"You son of a bitch!" Ken managed to rasp out as he catapulted up, all personal hurts thrown aside. He was an assassin, one of the best. Years under his belt, he wasn't going to be beaten down by some weaponless dead man. His hand caught up Omi's shopping bag, heavy with a square, boxed shape. Eight pounds at least, heavy and blunt, an improvised weapon. Omi wouldn't care anymore if his new purchase were damaged, that thought in itself was all the incentive he needed to grind his teeth together as he smashed the bag up into the man's face, leaping out of the way of startled flailing.  
  
He was going to keep going for the face until the man was down and out for the count. He had to get Omi out of the parking lot. He wasn't just another body to be left in his wake, and then he had to get home, get Aya and Youji out. Omi was dead now, wasn't breathing, wasn't moving. He wasn't going to let the same thing happen to his two remaining friends. He'd had enough of loss by this point to last him the rest of his natural life.  
  
His assailant chose that moment to pull a knife, slashing Ken across the upper arm as he continued to blindly attack, eyes running with blood. This was starting to get frightening, the adrenaline souring in his veins to cold-sweat fear. The man simply would not lie down and gurgle his own blood. He was more bodily fluids than face, but still unwilling to cooperate with Ken's ultimate design.  
  
The man ran at him again, bull-in-a-china-shop charging. Ken caught him and used his momentum to throw the man head over feet, he whipped around in time to see a pair of horrified faces, shoppers coming out for their cars in this deserted area. "Run." He told them, unwilling to spare more breath for a long-winded warning. Definitely a word to the wise, as the man was already getting back up again. "Why won't you die?" There wasn't any resentment behind the question, just simple puzzlement.  
  
"Because I have a debt to settle." He grasped air next to his side, expecting to find the handle of his knife. Ken gave him an almost-smile, flipping the missing weapon in his hand.  
  
"Not my usual choice of execution, but in your case it will have to do." Another blank almost-smile, frightening in its total lack of all tangible emotions. His arm snapped back, a well-learned motion, the blade dancing away from his fingertips, finding a new sheath in the nameless enemy's throat. He was gurgling now, teeth truly red now, not a watered down salmon color. Fingers scrabbled at his throat, desperate to remove the weapon, and still he was coming. Ken bashed the heel of his hand into that gruesome face, reclaiming the stained blade in the same motion.  
  
Crossing mental fingers he plunged the weapon into the man's lower abdomen, dragging the blade up, holding down the contents of his own stomach by will alone as steaming ropes of intestines spread on the pavement, hot against his shoes. Shuddering with revulsion, he tried to back away from that swaying horror, a loop of intestine actually catching behind his ankle and pitching him backwards.  
  
"Fuck!" He backed away, using his feet and hands to try to remove himself from all of this. Shouts were starting near the less used entrance; the escapees must have called in the big bad boys in blue. Time to leave, enemy dead or no. He certainly didn't need to be incarcerated for something like this. Omi wouldn't be happy... He stopped. Omi wouldn't be anything.  
  
Stumbling, he ignored Mr. Anonymous's inevitable collapse, falling to his knees next to Omi's still form, pulling a limp hand up to his lips. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I fucked up big time. You can't be dead! I'm sorry Omi."  
  
"Yeah." Omi agreed, eyes fluttering open for a fraction of a second.  
  
**************  
  
I was going to make this a cliff-hanger where you wouldn't know if Omi had pulled through or not, but I figured you Omi fans might wig out and disappear if you thought he was going to no longer be a player. Was that less boring for you all? I gave you blood and mild gore, is good? -crosses fingers- Let me know what you think, give me a feedback! Give me an e-mail, I'm always available at darkhunter@ijustdontcare.com though there might be a day or two's wait, or try me at akainobaka@mchsi.com, I'm somewhat lazy when it comes to computer obligations. DIE COMPUTER OF MINE! Well, to quote the IMMORTAL SPINNER DUNN (front "Death to Smoochy" of course!!!!), "Uhn… I'm gonna go get drunk now, uh, oh-kay!" -BAM!- 


	6. Chapter Six

Well, I'm officially lagging behind on this fanfiction! I do apologize, but I've been busy (as always). I do try though! ^_^   
  
**************  
  
"Wake up!" The chocolate rabbit squeaked at Youji. "You need to wake up, you stubborn son of a bitch!" The rabbit started shaking Youji all about, smearing chocolate goop all over his favorite shirt.  
  
"Shut up, rabbit. Rabbits are food, not for talking." He swatted at the impertinent confectionary hare.  
  
"What the hell are you talking about?" Ken's voice intruded upon the last blurred remnants of his dream. Youji pushed the looming brunette out of his face.  
  
"Can't a man even dream about fucking talking candy in peace anymore? You'd better have a damned good reason for waking me up; it's not even morning yet. You're going to need to provide evidence of the Second Coming if you want to survive. If there isn't a shining Caucasian man in a bathrobe descending from the skies, you'd better be ready to get a fist in the face." Youji attempted to block out the light creeping underneath his eyelids with a pillow.  
  
"Ko-ishi is not dead and he may be here any moment and we need to pack up and get out of here. Is that as important enough for you?"  
  
The sickly, metallic smell of blood finally registered. He forced himself into a state of semi-awareness. "What happened to you? Somebody beat you in the face with a washing machine?" He frowned at Ken's bloodied face. Ken was too busy jittering all over the place to notice.  
  
"You on drugs?" Youji caught Ken's chin in his hand, looking into his eyes. "Your eyes look fine... Think you can stop bouncing around like that? I've been awake for a matter of moments." His other hand grazed the empty side of the bed. "Where's Aya?"  
  
"Taking care of Omi." Ken was still shivering, looking as if he were considering going into shock. "You seem to be taking all of this well. Were you not listening to a word I said? Ko-ishi, of the big bad mojo, is not as dead as we previously thought him to be, and apparently some of his loyal henchmen share this state of un-dead. He's going to torch the house, we need to get out of here."  
  
That managed to catch Youji's attention the second time around. He grabbed Ken's shoulders, slammed him back into the bed's headboard. "You'd better have a fucking marvelous explanation behind this prank. You wake me up to feed me a line of bullshit like that! And what the hell did you do to Omi?"  
  
"It's not bullshit. I was attacked in a parking lot by a dead man. Fucking hell, Youji, I thought Omi was dead! Do you see me laughing? It's not a joke, we have to get out of here. He threw Omi into a lamp post and all but brained him."  
  
Youji pushed him away, started pulling on a random assortment of clothes. "This is my home. I've spent a shit load of hours trying to make it livable, I've spent even more money trying for the same goal. If anyone wants it they're going to have to go through me first." He started strapping on weapons. Apparently he'd been using some of his time well after all, building up new personal armory. "You want out, you take Aya and Omi with you and get gone. I'm not going to stand by while anyone torches yet one more house of mine."  
  
"I second that sentiment." Aya stepped back into the bedroom. "I'm tired of fleeing from place to place. I'm making a stand."  
  
Ken sighed heavily and pushed past Aya, heading for his first obligation. His main concert was curled up on their bed, breathing shallow and unhealthy. He hooked a chair closer with his foot, dropping down as the very last remnants of energy abandoned him. "Omi?"  
  
Omi started up, eyes flying open. "Ow!" His hand came up to his head, shying away at the last moment. "Oh no! How long was I asleep?" He tried to brace himself for a good prodding at the back of his head.  
  
"Don't do that." Ken caught wavering fingers in his own. "Aya just left a few minutes ago."  
  
"I can't sleep now, I have a mild concussion. When someone has a concussion you have to make sure they don't go to sleep and never wake up. I don't want to go to sleep forever." He slowly sat up, arm muscles shaking underneath the strain of his weight.  
  
"Only a mild one?"  
  
"My head is thicker than previously thought, I guess." He was swept into a fierce hug, biting his lower lip to keep from making any pain sounds.  
  
"I'm glad. I'm glad you have a sturdy skull. I don't know what I would have done if you'd really been dead." He knew his hand was holding Omi a bit too tightly, but he couldn't help it.  
  
"Whether you crush my ribs or not, I'm still not going anywhere." Omi decided to drop a tactful little hint, keeping his eyes tightly closed against the sudden vertigo.  
  
"Sorry." He forcibly pried his hands away, clenching them together in his lap. "Youji and Aya are going to stay. I told them Ko-Ishi was coming to play gleeful arsonist again, and they decided to make a stand. If you tell me what you want, I'll pack some things up for you and get you somewhere safe before the shit hits the fan."  
  
Omi stumbled upright. "I think not. Short of pulling an Aya and drugging me into submission, I'm sticking this out too. I'm feeling better already." He tried to give visible truth to the lie, widening his bleary eyes and forcing himself to stand upright.  
  
Someone knocked on the front door, the hollow raps echoing up the stairs and all throughout the silent house.  
  
"Looks like you're here by default." Ken pulled Omi into a careful hug, brushing a kiss across his forehead. "Stay up here."  
  
- - - - - - - - - - - - -   
  
"How much of this scare do you want to bet revolves around a hard knock Ken must have taken on his noggin?" The cocky grin Youji wore like armor looked a bit ragged around the edges. "You killed Ko-ishi, right? I mean, what YOU kill usually stays dead, right?"  
  
"He was in several pieces when I was through with him." Aya admitted. "His head being one of those separate pieces."  
  
"So, what's really going on? Some guy shows up, but Ken says he's sure he's killed him, right? It would help if I could hear it all from him again, he can be a tad more vocal than you when it's important."  
  
"He's busy with Omi right now."  
  
"Need to give that kid some tranquilizers." Youji said, referring to Ken.  
  
"Someone certainly wants us dead, that much is for sure. Whether they're all inhuman creatures back from the dead or clever punks hip on their current events, I'm assuming we're going to be up all night, right?" He tossed Aya a gun. Aya dropped it on the bed, nose wrinkled up as if he smelled something foul.  
  
"I don't need it."  
  
"Hey, garroting wire and honkin' big assed swords may be all good on a stealth mission, but this is a direct affront on our territory. You saw how Ken fared against one of them in hand-to-hand combat."  
  
"He was unarmed." Aya decided now would be a good time for arguing. "You'll find when a punch is headed by a set of six inch claws rather than knuckles, a lot more damage is done. Having your skull bones exploding backwards into your brain tends to put most people off their game for a while."  
  
"Blerg! What a pleasant topic to engage in right after waking. I've fought with Ken before, Omi as well. We're the best at what we do. If he had trouble with the guy, I'd probably be dead. I'd say anyone able to throw Omi four yards and manage to actually AIM the kid's flight, all the while beating Ken senseless warrants caution."  
  
"I just happen to have more faith in myself. If you can't depend on your own body and mind and reflexes, being dead is simply the better alternative." He managed to unearth the denim pants he'd been searching for. "If you don't start picking up after yourself, Youji, I'm going to make you stay in the unfinished bedroom, leaking ceiling or no."  
  
Another opportunity for Youji to play the lecher. "You know you'd miss me, babe." He push Aya back on the bed, straddling his lap. "Hey, since we're awake anyway..." He trailed off, biting his lower lip, rocking his hips suggestively against Aya's.  
  
Aya shoved him onto the floor. "Can't you ever be serious."  
  
Youji sighed, watching Aya pull on jeans from his new floor-level vantage point. "Is there no angle at which your ass does not appear to be less than sexy?"  
  
Aya kicked at him, not really intending any bodily harm.  
  
"Can't you ever have fun?"  
  
"Just because we received forewarning doesn't mean we can slack off. Has it been so long that you don't even know how to behave when lives are at stake?"  
  
"Look, now is not the time to be an asshole. You're sitting there telling me the star attraction of every nightmare these past months running may be back from the dead and he's headed this way. This is not a good time for Youji's sanity, try to be a little bit human, if you please."  
  
Aya tersely strapped on his few remaining blades, choosing to forego the last-layer trench coat, his only real armor. Unnerved by his sudden return to his old personality, Youji too finished in silence.  
  
"Your leg going to be okay if something really does happen?"  
  
"Here's for hoping." Aya returned the flat smile, the expression almost frightening on his pale face.  
  
Downstairs, someone knocked on the door. They looked at one another, grabbed up their weapon of choice and headed down the stairs.  
  
- - - - - - - - - - - -  
  
Ken was a few steps ahead of them, shoulders squared, claws strapped on, ready for whatever the situation demanded. Youji and Ken deferred to Aya, stepping back as he threw open the door, gun pointed and claws poised.  
  
The doorway was empty; a cursory glance around revealed no one. "There's an envelope." Ken pointed out. There certainly was an envelope, a simple, unassuming thing lying on their doormat.  
  
Aya stooped to snatch it up, katana still out and prepared to act as defense.  
  
"Don't open it." Unexplainable dread overtook Youji. "Don't open it. It's something horrible. Just put it back down and leave it. They'll be back, leave it alone."  
  
Pale hands disregarded the warning, thumbing open the unsealed flap. They drew out a photograph, a hastily snapped Polaroid.  
  
"Aya? What is it?" Youji tried to see over his shoulder, gun lowering.  
  
Aya ran an unsteady finger across the photograph, looking back out the open doorway, stepping forward. He peered around, hoping for one glimpse of a retreating form, something he could use as a punching bag for instant venting. Nothing.  
  
"Stay here. I'll be back." He dropped the crumpled picture on the ground, stepping out into the evening sleet, headed for the garage.  
  
"Wait! What the fuck is going on?" Youji dashed after him, managed to grab hold of his shoulder. "Of all times, NOW is the least sensible for you to go and pull something like this. This is how they want you to react." Youji was willing to bet that the latter of those statements was accurate. Anyone who knew even the slightest bit about Aya could easily find a dozen ways to set him off on a rampage. "We need to stick together until we know what's going on. Don't run out now."  
  
Aya turned, "I don't know any other way to react. Don't wait up for me." He shook Youji's hand off, taking the last few steps into the garage, already fumbling keys out of his pocket.  
  
"Youji?"  
  
Youji gave Aya up for the momentary lost cause he'd become and loped back towards Ken.  
  
"Yes?"  
  
"Who's she? Do you know?" Ken held up the picture he'd retrieved from the pavement.  
  
"Shit." Youji whispered before dashing back the other way. He had to reach Aya before it was too late. And it was too late, he realized as he just barely managed to avoid becoming a Youji pancake, Aya roaring away, off to wreak whatever vengeance he could manage.  
  
"Youji! Maybe you could be useful and tell me what the fuck's going on?" Ken dragged him back into the house. "Standing outside like an imbecile isn't going to make Aya decided to turn around and come back."  
  
"I can't tell you." Youji took the photograph from Ken's fingers, staring blankly at the dark haired girl in the picture, eyes closed, slumped over in the back seat of a car as if unconscious or dead. Or in a coma. "I promised him."  
  
"Some promises have to be broken. This involves all of us now. Who is she?"  
  
He took a deep breath. "I'll make this as fast as I can, and then I need to leave, you and Omi are going to be stranded here until I manage to track down Aya. The girl is Aya's sister. She's comatose, was in a hospital up until this picture was taken, and now she's officially been kidnapped. Fairly straight forward. Give me your keys." Youji held his hand out.  
  
"Aya has a sister? Since when?"  
  
"Keys."  
  
"You can't go after him, you dumb fuck. You're just as bad as he is. He did what they wanted, and the next step now would be for all three of us to go chasing after him. Or at least for you to go chasing after him. Aya can take care of himself, that's not a problem. Don't do what they expect, stay here. Who knows what they have in mind for the house once we're out on an Aya-hunt. He'll come back, and if he doesn't, then it's one death instead of four."  
  
Youji hemmed and hawed, wanting to go after Aya, knowing for a fact that it was an illogical desire going on the facts laid out before him. He took a shuddery breath; let it out. "I take first watch." It wasn't a request.  
  
Ken nodded. "Wake me up when you can't stay awake any longer, we'll need someone up and alert at all times from now on." He kicked the door shut, blocking out the steady stream of sleet that had been trying to ice down their carpet. "Thank you for not making this any worse. I need to go keep an eye on Omi now, but believe me, this isn't the end of all topics. When things have calmed down a little I sure as hell want to know what Aya's been doing hiding a sister from us all."  
  
"We all have things we don't want everyone else to know about. It's a matter of privacy and it's not your right to question him."  
  
"Yeah, but I'm pushy like that. Goodnight Youji, don't go falling asleep on us. I'd like to stay alive for a while longer."  
  
Youji sat down on the living room couch to watch the front door, tuning out the steady thudding of Ken's feet blindly making their way up the staircase.  
  
**************  
  
Gah, me and my predictable plot twists. How many people saw that one coming? -counts all raised hands- Oh well, this is my lazy project; fanfictions require less effort than other writing projects. They are for amusement purposes only. And stuff like that. Mostly I'm just trying to build things up so I can squeeze in a few more lemons and lots of gore. Whee! I love blood and gore! Maybe a few explosions too... -drools all over her monkey shirt- Well, I've suitably terrorized all the small children and puppies, so I'll be off. Drop me a line at darkhunter@ijustdontcare or akainobaka@mchsi.com My e-mail is evil and unreliable, but if I get an e-mail I'll be sure to reply to it ^_^! Hehe, I like feedbacks too, you know! I CRAVE THEM! It's a scientific law that feedback makes fanfiction writers write more quickly. Or maybe not. 


	7. Chapter Seven

Dum de dum dum dum. Whenever I'm F*#&ing bored, I sing a stupid song, and whistle a tuneless dirge so no one ever knows I can really siiiiiing, while lazing about my house I write silly fanfics, ones that have angst and dicks, and lemons tooo-oooo. Uhm... The King and I?? -backs away nervously- Uhm... Caffine? Cheese? -turns tail and flees-  
  
**************  
  
Morning was breaking. Hated, unwanted morning. Rose colored light pouring in through lidless windows, reminding him that the night has passed and he was still sitting up. His back was aching from too long a period of time spent upright on the lumpy-new couch. They hadn't had a chance to properly break it in yet. Hell, Youji didn't want to consider any furniture broken in until he and Aya had had sex on it at least once or twice. Like that would happen any time soon.  
  
"You still up?" Ken snuck up behind him.  
  
Youji put a hand over his quickened heartbeat. "Thanks for the warning! One of these times you're going to get seriously maimed!"  
  
Ken smiled, trying not to stretch his swollen lower lip. "It's a little late for that warning." He sat next to Youji. "I can stay up for a while now, go and get some sleep."  
  
"You don't look very rested to me."  
  
"Didn't get much shut eye. I felt the need to wake Omi up every few hours to make sure he hadn't slipped off to la-la land forever. Aya isn't back yet?" Ken frowned at the front door. "If he's not back in a few hours we definitely need to look into it."  
  
Youji refrained from commenting, wanting to look into it now. Trying to twist and pop his back all he managed to do was send some sharp pains running down his spine. "Hate this couch."  
  
"Lean forward." Ken shifted closer, running bent knuckles up either side of Youji's spine. "The first place he'd go would be the hospital, right? It's only logical to make sure it's not a bluff before charging off to try to make some unknown enemy pay."  
  
"Mmhmm." Youji agreed, not really paying much attention. "A bit higher... right there." He leaned into the rough touch delivering him from that niggling pain.  
  
"Been a while, eh?" Ken continued talking, never halting the repetitive motions of his hand. "Either way, we'll give Omi some more sleep time and see what sort of condition he's in when he wakes up. How he is will shape our next plan of action. Finding Aya is our next big must-do."  
  
Youji put forth some more agreeable sounds, perfectly content to let someone else make the decisions. It got tiring always being responsible in some way or another for Aya's actions. "I haven't had a nice backrub in forever." He let his head rest against Ken's shoulder, eyes drooping with newly noted weariness.  
  
Ken didn't question the lack of forthcoming massages from Aya's direction. Their private life wasn't his business, Aya had made that crystal clear whenever possible.  
  
Ken was just getting ready to doze off, lulled by the rhythmic stroking he was slowly tapering off and the warm body slumped against his side, when the whispery sounds of bare feet on wooden floors alerted his senses.  
  
"Ken?" Omi crawled up onto the couch next to him. "I couldn't find you when I woke up." He sounded like a sleepy child, voice slurred, a tad unsure. Omi lifted Ken's free arm and burrowed down under it. "I didn't know where you were. My head hurts."   
  
Ken sighed and ran gentle fingers across the much diminished lump on the back of Omi's head, parting mussed blonde hair to get a better look. Omi made no protest, asleep again.  
  
"Shit." Ken shook him gently, trying to keep Youji still on his other side. "Omi, wake up."  
  
"Hmmm?"  
  
He received a sleepy little frown. "Ken? Where'd you go? I woke up and you were gone? When did I come down here?" He rubbed balled up fists across unfocused eyes.  
  
"Do you remember what happened?" Ken asked.  
  
"Yeah. And I looked and looked, but you weren't there." A child on the verge of muted hysterics.  
  
"Do you remember why your head hurts?" He smoothed tangled bangs away from confused cornflower eyes.  
  
Omi shook his head. "No. I don't want to remember. Just want to sleep for a while. You won't go away again?"  
  
"No, just get some rest, I'll be right here." Ken sighed and tried to make himself comfortable between the two sleeping assassins on either side. "I feel like the interior of a sandwich."  
  
"Yeah, you sort of look like one too." Youji informed him, not quite asleep as previously assumed. "Am I to take it that Omi won't be involved in any of our future plans for the day?"  
  
"Yup." Ken shifted, resting his own head on top of Omi's. "You want we should just sleep for a few hours more?"  
  
Youji turned his head, chin resting on Ken's newly exposed neck. "Hey, I've got plenty of good reasons to do the opposite. I've got an Aya running around out there doing who the fuck knows what, and I'm certainly not inclined to leave him to his own devices."  
  
"He can take care of himself."  
  
"In the most basic sense of those words, yes he can. He's not exactly Champion of Sane Reactions. Hate to say it, but I'm worried about him. If you want to stick around here and keep an eye on Omi, go for it. I'd feel concern about leaving him here by himself anyway. I need to get out though, hunt him down."  
  
"You're not going to get any sleep beforehand?"  
  
Youji shook his head, pointy chin grinding against Ken's collarbone. "No such luck. Time waits for no man, and Aya has no concept of time when he's busy being psycho." He stood, stretching his arms above his head until he heard that series of 'cracks' he'd been waiting for, up and down his back.  
  
"Going to grab a shower first. You can think about whether or not you're participating in this. If not, I'm afraid I'm going to have to 'borrow' your car. Aya's in possession of the one he and I were sharing."  
  
Ken settled down, cradling Omi's heavy head against his chest, making an effort to keep awake. These next few days would be tired ones, he already knew that much. And there was still the question of Kakaria. He didn't want to stand her up. She was a nice girl, but things were beyond hectic and he still had Omi to contend with. Hell, his opinion of Omi had gone up in the past day just because of the near loss. It was human nature to fail to properly appreciate something until it was in danger.  
  
"Wake up."  
  
Ken blinked himself back into awareness, Youji standing over him, dressed for a voyage into the outside world, hair almost dried. "I fell asleep?" He rubbed at his face, trying to throw off that comfortable lethargy. It was hard to think about actually doing something when he was beyond warm and content.  
  
"I'll give you a call every few hours." Youji set the cordless phone on the arm of the couch next to him. "That way you'll know nothing happened to me, and I'll know if I need to get my ass back here because something's going down. No one should attempt anything while it's daylight so you'll be safe to nap, I'd assume. Wish me luck."  
  
"G'luck." Ken closed his eyes again, preferring sleep to temporary leave-taking.  
  
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -  
  
Time blurred into an endless stream of wearied traveling. It'd been a long while since Aya had been this up close and personal with the city's sewer systems and he'd been lost so many times it didn't bear thinking about. They were down here, somewhere. Waiting. He wasn't going to give up until he'd found them and made them pay. Until he had his sister back.  
  
His legs went out from underneath his body as the ground below dropped down a number of feet, unseen in the darkness. He bit back curse after curse, teeth grinding together as he mastered his pain. He could already feel the pulsing warmth of infection branching up his damaged leg. It didn't matter. He'd come this far, bullying those in the know until he'd found this lead. There were far worse things than overgrown rats hiding out down in this muck pit.  
  
His hand slid down the wall before it found a purchase, levering himself back into a standing position. They'd probably been right to try and stop him. He was in no shape to be trekking off to war at this point. The fact that he was willing to even mentally discuss the topic with himself was a sign that his body had reached its limits.  
  
Whether he found his prey or not, Aya had no idea how he'd manage to leave. He didn't know how much further his ailing body would be willing to take him. The next time he fell might be the last time, left to drown, face down in the filthy waters below him.  
  
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -  
  
"So, he basically was flipping out?" Youji leaned across the counter, rephrasing the nurse's fifteen-minute tirade. He rubbed distractedly at the ache forming behind his eyes.  
  
"I'd say so. He took a few minutes to verify that she was gone, and then he was gone. Took off like a bat out of hell."  
  
"And you have no idea where he was headed next?"  
  
"He said some crazy stuff about getting revenge."  
  
"Well that is to be assumed!" Youji snorted, exasperated. He hated dealing with people who didn't comprehend Aya's inherent quirks. It was a time waster, having to explain the whats and whys of any given situation. The world would be so much nicer if everyone understood not to expect sane reactions from Aya, and more importantly, if the world wouldn't hold him responsible for any oddities as he came tripping along through the aftermath."  
  
"He is going to pay for the damage he caused, right?" The nurse snapped her gum at him. Youji wondered if she'd ever choked herself on that massive wad of chewing gum in her mouth.  
  
"Barring another unexpected house fire, you can reach me at this address." Youji scribbled out their current abode's statistics. "I'm perfectly willing to reimburse you for any damages you can prove to be related to Mr. Fujimiya."  
  
"House fire?" She asked his retreating form. "Goddamned idiots, think they can do whatever they please." She snapped her gum a few more times before responding to the newly ringing phone, cursing everyone and anyone's existence before rolling the requisite perky greeting off her tongue.  
  
Youji strolled around, looking at the various decimated electronic implements, took a moment to peer around the girl's empty room. Glass crunched underfoot as he strode about, searching for some sort of clue. The shattered, plate glass window was just one of the many indications of Aya's terrible rage.  
  
"Damnit! If I were Aya and completely insane to boot, where would I head next? Who would I know of that might know of my sister's location?" He spoke aloud to himself, trying to reason out a plan of action. Aya could be anywhere. He left the room, headed for the elevator. He'd just have to keep thinking. Something would turn up.  
  
"No! I said I don't want to go! Where's my mommy!" A young child shrieked as she was all but dragged past Youji, down the hallway. The entire right side of her face was covered with a bandage, blood seeping through. He could see from the damage peeping from underneath the slipping bandage that her right eye was entirely gone; it had to be judging by the underlying structure damage. One eye...  
  
"One-Eye!!!" Youji yelped triumphantly. The nurse dragging the upset child along gave him a glare worthy of Aya's appreciation. "He'd go see One-Eye. Maybe not first, but somewhere in the scheme of things!" He toned this revelation down. He really needed to stop talking to himself aloud.  
  
One-Eye had been a very important contact in his day. He supplied anything to everyone, and being a blind old man, much was said around him. Anyone who was responsible for the well being of a comatose young girl would need special equipment, right? Who better to get that from than One-Eye? Unlike the government suppliers, he wouldn't require paperwork or elaborate explanations.  
  
"Don't run!" The gum snapper shouted after Youji as he breezed by her. He did not deign to reply. He had other things on his mind.  
  
**************  
  
Mwah ha! Go me, I have another finished chapter available. Don't worry, I'm sure I'll be able to come up with something to officially offset the whole cliché "Oh no! Aya/Ran's sister is gone!" plot. And I still have to take care of that lying little whore, Ken! -stomps on him- Shame on you, Ken! Making silly, concussed little Omi sad. -tries to think up evil things-, I'll try to put some time into the next chapter, but with my schedule, don't count on anything for a few days. Give me encouragement! Make my poor, aching feet happy! E-mail me at darkhunter@ijustdontcare.com or akainobaka@mchsi.com and give me a feedback! You're allowed to say bad things if you feel they're justified! Make my day, mortals! 


	8. Chapter Eight

Give me feedback or face my wrath! I know where you live and I could end your life!  
  
**************  
  
Ken pushed the door inwards, overwhelmed by the bustle and noise created by the coffee shop's patrons. Omi was still at home, sleeping, so he had to make this quick and uncomplicated. Get in, say goodbye, get out. No further risks beyond his first obvious one. Now, where was she?  
  
He spotted the back of her dark head, hair feathered out in a way he liked even from behind, even partially obstructed by other people. And he'd be willing to eat his socks if she didn't have the most beautiful back he'd ever seen. She could pull of a tank top in a way he'd never seen another female competently do before. It took effort to immediately pull up images of a sad, huge eyed Omi to offset those perfect shoulder blades. Back in the role of the licentious asshole again.  
  
"Uh, hi." Ken lifted his hand in a feeble wave as he skirted her table, hastily dropping down into the seat across from her.  
  
"Hi! I was starting to wonder if you were planning on skipping out on me!" She flashed him a winning smile. Ken contemplated kicking himself.  
  
"This isn't such a good time. I'm going to have to leave in a few minutes. There are some not so pleasant things going on right now in my life. I'd love to stay and have coffee with you and swap life stories, but I need to get back as soon as I can."  
  
Kakaria pouted prettily. "Is that all the information I'm going to get out of you?"  
  
It was that one question that jolted home what Ken already knew. What could he possibly tell her? The truth was out of the question. She wasn't the sort of girl who'd put up with a shameless murderer, the sort of girl he could ever live a normal life with. He'd passed beyond the boundary of human a long while ago. "Just a lot of family troubles conglomerating into one huge mess."  
  
"Hmm, family issues I can understand." She threw her head back and laughed. "Hell, you've already met my grandmother, and it's easily assumed that the rest of my family is the same. Sometimes I think I'm the only sane one with the capability for avoiding trouble."  
  
Ken kept his opinions to himself. Anyone stupid enough to see something of interest in himself had to be asking for it. Everything he touched eventually fell away into decay. A walking death sentence. Only Omi could survive his attention, bound by the same darkness.  
  
"Shall we reschedule this date then?" Kakaria immediately tried to further things. She was bolder than most people Ken had become used to, excluding Aya, of course. Aya assumed he could do whatever to whomever whenever he felt like it. Granted, that was usually how he managed to get the impossible done...  
  
He tried to sum up all his confused emotions in one sentence, shifted words around in his mind, and gave up. "Sure, we'll exchange phone numbers so I can actually reach you next time. I'll have to wait until things are less hectic before I can make any new plans." He wanted this, for himself. She was everything every one of the girls he'd ever dated had been, but better in a thousand ways. Strong, attractive, intelligent, and most of all audacious; willing to speak her mind and laugh without covering her mouth and appearing embarrassed by her own hilarity, to be the first one to request a date. He would have given his limbs for someone like that before he became involved with Weiss and his new nightlife. Fuck, he'd still give up as many of those members as he could live without. Arms aren't always useful, right?  
  
"Here." Kakaria scribbled down her number on a napkin, using a pen she'd fished from her purse. She even showed signs of being prepared for reasonable difficulties. It'd been eons since he'd run across a female who not only remembered to carry pens around with her, but who also knew right off the bat where it was kept. Organized, capable of at least limited forethought. Granted, he could just be reading unrealistic things into her actions, trying to turn her into some unattainable angel. It wouldn't be the first time he'd done such a thing.  
  
Scribbling down their temporary home phone number and pushing it across the table, he stood. When he leaned down to retrieve Kakaria's contact number, she stretched up and planted a friendly kiss on his cheek. "Heh, well, it's been fun, Kenster, we should do this again sometime, but maybe without the waiting beforehand and perhaps scrapping the part where you run off after four minutes." She wasn't being rude or sarcastic, merely cheerful and joking. Ken wished all people could deal so wonderfully with disappointments.  
  
"I'll second that. I am sorry. I look forward to seeing you again when things calm down." And he really did, Ken realized as he left the shop. He was already thinking about seeing her again, places they could meet up. He didn't have time for this. He had a house to guard, a concussed, confused boyfriend to deal with, and a missing teammate. Not a good time to think about falling head over heels for some girl he met at a grocery store while she was stalking him.  
  
As soon as he pushed open the front door to the house, he was struck by the absolute silence of it all. Immediately giving in to panic, he raced up the stairs, knowing Omi would be gone. They'd waited until he'd left and then they'd made their move, they'd come and taken Omi. It didn't matter who 'they' were, only that they were officially on his AND Aya's shit list.  
  
He smashed their closed door open, panting for breath as he looked about, expecting scattered covers, overturned furniture, some sort of ransom note written in blood. Instead he wound up having to calm down a disoriented and startled Omi, so tangled up in covers that he'd trapped himself in an impromptu cocoon, blissfully asleep until Ken had come pounding towards the scene.  
  
"I'm sorry! I didn't mean to scare you!" He hugged Omi, doing his damndest to turn down the situation. "I thought you'd be up by now, and with everything all quiet, I though someone had come and taken you away."  
  
Omi burrowed childishly into his chest. "I was having the nicest dream." He grumped, preparing to drop off into slumber again. "Being loud wouldn't have made me not-gone."  
  
"No, you're right about that." Ken toed off his shoes, maneuvering them both beneath the covers, holding tightly to Omi's sleeping body. "I was still worried though." He closed his eyes, resting his cheek against the top of Omi's head. The second time in as many days that he'd thought Omi to be gone. Maybe it was some sort of sign from above that he needed to stop taking things for granted. Or not. More likely was the fact that his life was just always going to suck and he would always be fearful for the safety of those who mattered to him. Maybe it was a sign he needed to not set up coffee dates with unknown girls when he already had someone waiting at home for him.  
  
"Love you." Ken sighed quietly, nuzzling at soft blonde hair.  
  
"Hmmm." Omi smiled back in his sleep, tucking his own head more tightly under Ken's chin. For a short while, this was a sort of peace.  
  
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -  
  
"What do you want now?" One-Eye fussed loudly, doing his best to make his displeasure clear. "Every time there's trouble somewhere, you and your crazy friends start popping up again, trying to hound an old man to his death. No respect for the venerable, no respect for ME!"  
  
Youji kicked the door shut behind him, locking the door and flipping the "Open" sign over. It was time to play mean. He had no qualms about bullying blind old men. He'd killed a few of those in his day. "I'm looking for a friend of mine. He would have stopped by here, hunting for information about a man known as Ko-ishi, the same one responsible for the torching of our property."  
  
"Ko-ishi died. You should know that." The old man's voice remained steady, not the slightest bit intimidated by Youji's menacing tone.  
  
"I'm not asking about Ko-ishi, I'm asking about my partner in crime." No names were used. They were minor players on the scale of things, Weiss Kreuz was, they hadn't the infamy to need codenames or catch phrases. One-Eye knew who they were, their voices, their demeanor, that was all that mattered.  
  
He signed, tapping his fingers on the counter top in a show of nonchalance. "Yes, he was in here. Ranting and raving in between questions about rented out medical equipment and the activities of a dead man. Care to fill me in on the madness?"  
  
Youji sighed. "I have no information for you, and that shouldn't require an explanation. I don't seek any knowledge outside propriety. I just want to know my friend's next destination."  
  
"You going to leave my store after that?"  
  
"'S a deal."  
  
"I didn't rent out any serious medical equipment, but I did direct him towards another miscellaneous dealer; I can tell you how to reach him, and I also sent him to a purveyor of great knowledge. Between the two of them, he should have found whatever he was asking about."  
  
"He didn't disclose any other intents? He didn't mention any other place he might visit?"  
  
"No."  
  
"Fuck it all. Fine, tell me where to find the two people you referred him to. I need to track him step by step then."  
  
One-Eye grudgingly gave him the information, more out of a tired lack of concern than any actual desire to help or avoid property damage. There were more important things he had to worry about. It wasn't easy being old.  
  
Youji headed for the illicit dealer of all things necessary first. He figured that would be Aya's first stop. He was so hung up on his sister that all prospects tainted by her possible association would come first.  
  
Another frenzied drive through town and he reached "Cobarde's" place of business. Just another beat up, abandoned looking house. Youji was assuming it held a treasure trove of wonders inside. The door was locked, apparently closed for the day. An easily solved problem. What self-respecting assassin was incapable of picking a lock?  
  
Stealthy steps took him through a surprisingly lavish interior, a contrast to the shabby outside of the building. Everything was dead silent; it was hard to fight for absolute soundlessness. The air felt wrong.  
  
It took him a few moments to associate the dark staining on the floor with the dried blood it appeared to be. Youji mentally created a few elaborate curses, pulled his handgun from its shoulder holster and kicked the door to the kitchen open. He promptly had to turn and retch.  
  
The mess hanging over the kitchen table was barely recognizable as human. Hung from the ceiling with steel hooks piercing its shoulders and upper thighs, its chest cavity was opened, bared to the blood stained floor, skin pulled out and stretched into some sort of display, fastened with line leading up to the ceiling supports. Youji didn't check to confirm his suspicions of specifically missing organs or bizarre maiming. The man was hanging in the air with his ribs shining slickly at anyone who cared to get close enough to see. That was more than enough to convince him to leave.  
  
The thought that Aya could be responsible for the atrocity never occurred to him. He would believe Aya to be capable of that sort of focused violence, but who would want to associate the two. Aya wouldn't plan ahead and obtain the devices he'd need for the complex death, would he? Not for someone so far out of the loop from the real problem. Right?  
  
Time to see the woman; the one in the know. She was outside the loop, a non-player. The same as Youji and the gang. No known affiliations, but many hidden sources. One-Eye hadn't had many good things to say about her. Then again, being One-Eye, he had very few good things to say about anyone.  
  
A pretty little apartment building in the middle of the least-rugged downtown area. Not the dive he'd expected. He wound up having to suffer through an over exuberant security guard who insisted the people in the building depended on him to keep out the riffraff. Youji wound up waiting in the lobby for another ten minutes while the guard talked with his woman on the phone in hushed tones. Youji threw in a comment about being sent by One-Eye. It was passed along to the tiny voice on the phone. The voice said something that was apparently derogatory to the security guard's mental state. Youji was allowed up with much reluctance. Life was a bitch.  
  
The door opened on his first knock. A diminutive, non-descript woman ushered him in, shutting the door behind them as quickly as possible.  
  
"Miss, this won't take long, I-"  
  
"Shut up." She snapped at him, voice oddly accented. He tried to place her speech alteration as she stood still, listening for something.  
  
"Explanation?" He inquired when she finally raised a hand in acknowledgment.  
  
"I was making sure you weren't bugged. I will not be spied upon." She frowned darkly at nothing in particular. Youji considered bolting. She wasn't gruesomely murdered, but she did seem to be fairly crazy. He hated dealing with the paranoid; they wore on his patience.  
  
"Right... This won't take long. One-Eye referred me to you. A friend of mine might have visited you today. Red hair, pale skin; a fairly angry man. Sound familiar?"  
  
"You? You're with that rude man?" She stomped her foot. "The Striking Cobra is not used to such treatment." Her arms crossed as she assumed an expression of disdain. Youji took a deep breath.  
  
"Yes, he's rude. Yes, he's demanding. Yes, he's almost as crazy as you appear to be. Let's move on, shall we? I need to know what you told him; what he told you. Do you know where he went after talking with you?" Youji crossed his fingers, hoping she wouldn't list the dead man's store as Aya's next destination. A dead end.  
  
"He seeks the undead." She smiled. Not a nice smile at that. "So do I. He was wrong for the task, but you I will assist. The dead man hides, below the city like the vermin who serve him. I sent the man you seek on the path of his foe, possibly to his death."  
  
"Fucking bitch!" Youji slammed her into the wall, her skull making a satisfying crack against the subtly flowered wallpaper. "If he is dead, then you can rest assured you'll be soon to follow!"  
  
"He is not dead yet. I will help you find him." She wheezed out, still maintaining that bizarre aura of dignity and inhuman knowledge. She gave Youji the fucking creeps. "I hoped you would follow in his wake. I will help you. We leave now." She twisted sharply, kneeing Youji in the stomach and freeing herself from his clutching hands, marching off into another room.  
  
Youji followed. He watched with a mixture of amusement and uncertainty as she strapped numerous weapons on over her conservative business suit, exchanging her low heels for combat boots at the last moment. An odd combination. She couldn't be more than five feet tall. She was crazy. No other option.  
  
She smiled. "Come Kudou, it's time for an adventure." Youji thought for the umpteenth time how absolutely bizarre this was all turning out to be. He was supposed to welcome her along on his trip 'below the city'? He assumed she meant the sewers. Where else would one find vermin, philosophical or otherwise? He didn't even ask how she knew his last name. She was crazy and mystical and all that shit. It didn't bear reasoning.  
  
"Well, this has been pleasant, but I really must be going. I work alone. Thank you for your assistance, but we part ways now." Youji backed out of the bedroom. She pulled a rifle from the assortment of firearms spread across her demure bedspread and pointed it at his skull.  
  
"Now is not a time to balk."  
  
Youji sighed heavily. This was getting older and older every second. "So, you want to join me on this pleasant outing. Fine. You get me to Aya and you avoid having your neck wrung. Now get that thing out of my face before I shove it up into a very unpleasant orifice."  
  
She lowered the weapon.  
  
"So, what am I to call you? Mystical Bitch who Sees All? The Striking Cobra?" He wriggled his fingers mockingly.  
  
"You may call me Fate."  
  
**************  
  
Hehe, I have trouble keeping things non-humorous. If I can't do things from Youji's sardonic point of view, then I must work it into the plot. Her name isn't really Fate, by the way. She's just sort of uhm... mystical and crazy and all that shit. -sighs- I'm zonked out. Give me yay! I will give you smut and angst and violence and drama in return! Don't you want smut and violence and drama? AND angst! Look at me! Signing my life away. -giggles to self- Gah, I need to go away now before I start saying even more bizarre things. Thanks for all of those who have left me feedback already! Yay for you! NOW GIVE ME MORE! -bites her own arm- RARRR akainobaka@mchsi.com or darkhunter@ijustdontcare.com 


	9. Chapter Nine

-gives out candy- Feed the children of America! We must become the most unhealthy, useless nation possible! Feed the children candy!  
  
**************  
  
Frantic didn't begin to describe the state of panic Ken found himself in. It had been eight hours since his last phone conversation with Youji. They were picking them off, one by one. First by luring Aya out with his sister, then by luring Youji out with Aya. An incessant line of creatures swallowed by the old woman of a similarly themed song. A continuous death trap. Ken was going to have to go out looking for Youji soon, and if Ken didn't find himself whisked away to the unknown netherworlds, then Omi would be gone when he returned, and they'd use Omi as the final piece of bait. Hopeless.  
  
He'd been force-feeding Omi tea laden with painkillers whenever he could keep Omi awake long enough to swallow anything. It was better, he supposed, being burdened with the task of worrying. He was an asshole, deserving of whatever problems came his way; better Omi should sleep through the troublesome bits. Eight hours and no phone call. He hadn't woken up to a phone call during the while he'd been sleeping, and the phone in their room was loud enough it wasn't a matter of sleeping through the call. He'd hurled the thing at enough walls due to rude morning awakenings that it was a surprise the machine still worked at all.  
  
Ken puttered about, trying to keep his mind focused on other things. He made soup from scratch, something full of cheese and potatoes, keeping it heated until such a time provided itself that he could make Omi eat that as well. He used Omi's computer to fish about on the Internet for past issues concerning their invisible foe, Ko-ishi, searching for someone who would take up his name, his men. Omi woke up and he dragged him downstairs for some company, groggy and cranky as it might be. Still no phone call.  
  
Omi fell asleep on the couch, curled up in a shivering ball. Ken felt even more insensitive and ran upstairs to get a blanket for him. Of course, the downstairs front door had to come flying open right as his foot hit the top stair, leaving him too far away from Omi to protect him.  
  
Ken charged back down the stairs, strapping the gloves he'd had with him for the past eight hours, worry leading to paranoia. Sometimes the paranoid really are being stalked. Or at least are really being slaughtered one by one. He lunged at the oddly hunched figures lumbering awkwardly through the door, turning his claws away at the last moment, turning what would have been a killing blow into a stunning one.  
  
"Fuck you too, Ken!" Youji spat at him from the ground, holding a hand up to his aching jaw in the dim light. While Ken tried not to have a heart attack from the combined relief and delayed reaction shock, a slight figure skipped past him. "What a dump." It intoned in an accented alto before turning and hauling the sprawled form of Aya up from the ground, mindful not to get too much of the reeking muck splattered across his body on her own clothing.  
  
"Help me get the crazy one somewhere he can lie down; he's on his last legs and he won't keep going for much longer. I don't fancy burying any bodies tonight. I'm already tired." The equally filthy woman kicked Youji in the leg. "Get up, lazy man."  
  
Youji used the hand not covering his sore ribs to push himself up. "Bitch." He commented in an offhand manner.  
  
"Where the fuck have you been? Why didn't you call? What happened? Is Aya okay? Who the fuck is she? What is that god awful stench?" Ken spluttered out the first set of questions that came to mind.  
  
"If the blonde one on the couch is as stupid as the rest of you appear to be, I'm going to leave you to your own devices." The woman informed him.  
  
"And good fucking riddance!" Youji snapped as he shouldered the full weight of Aya's half-limp body. "I got sidetracked. I had to wander around the fucking sewers for who knows how many fucking hours and now we all fucking reek of shit and whatever the fuck was floating around down there! I'm going to do my best to get all that muck off Aya and then I'm taking a goddamned shower and you, bitch, can just wait your fucking turn. If you can't wait, we have a hose outside." He half walked, half dragged a glassy eyed, somewhat confused looking Aya up the stairs.  
  
It was a hard trip up the stairs, reminiscent-in a strange sort of way-of the last stumbling trip he remembered making up a flight of stairs with Aya. Only that time they'd been trying to take it into a bedroom before things got publicly unacceptable in the hallway. Granted, they hadn't been covered with human waste or blood at the time either, and Aya had actually been conscious enough of his surroundings to enjoy the whole thing.  
  
Aya tried to head for their bedroom, weakly striking out from Youji's supporting shoulder.  
  
"I think not! You get that crap on the bed, I'm never sleeping there again! C'mon Aya, walkies, waaaalllkies. We're going walkies over to the bathrooooom." Youji practiced his own brand of idiocy while he dragged a resisting Aya further down the hall. Shit did NOT wash out of silk sheets very well, as far as he knew, and quite frankly, he didn't feel like experimenting in the matter firsthand.  
  
With the bathroom door shut behind them, the stench started to become noticeable. "Who'd have ever thought wading through the underbelly of the city could be so decidedly unglamorous. You only see food color water down there in the movies." Youji complained.  
  
Aya sighed heavily. "Youji, they flush the contents of their toilets down there, where is it exactly you think it goes to? Is there supposed to be a special section for the less appealing bits of human waste to go?" His head sagged down to his chest even as he countered Youji's whining. The weariness appeared to generate equally from mental and physical exertion.  
  
"Someone's been down there, I saw signs of other people. There must be a nicer section they've found so they don't have to go wading every time they want to visit the surface. I have to go back." Aya tried to stand on his own again, stumbling down to one knee.  
  
"Okay, we'll go back later, when I manage to get you clean enough that we can take a look at your leg." Youji soothingly told him, not even ready to tackle the concept of dealing with that annoying "Fate" bitch and her bizarre reasons until Aya was taken care of.  
  
Aya gave the tub a dauting look. "I can't rest now, I have to find Aya." His face said he physically wanted to do anything BUT; worn out to the point of collapsing. "The next move will be revealed soon, and I need to be ready for whatever comes our way."  
  
"Aya."  
  
He looked over, eyes slanted.  
  
"Don't give me that obsessive bullshit right now. I may not be as tired as you are, but I did stay up all fucking night, worrying what sort of trouble you'd been stupid enough to get into this time, and I did go following after you, wandering through the same miles of sewage that you did. All I want right now is to be clean and perhaps to get a nap in. Because of Fate's presence, that last option appears to be out for me, so I'm warning you now, if you get in the way of bathing, your ass IS grass."  
  
"Damnit, Youji. She's all I have left now. She's my life. They took her away. Am I supposed to just give up and do nothing? I HAVE to do something. Life helps those who help themselves. She's all I have left and she's gone, and there has to be something I can do about that. I don't want to be hindered now. Right befor me, the sum of my life is missing in action."  
  
"It's nice to know I'm appreciated around here." Youji said flatly, flipping the toilet seat down and dumping Aya onto it, filthy clothes and all. He turned to start the hot water, gingerly peeling off his clothing. Literally peeling them off. Sometimes he hated all the things that went along with their career of choice. Sometimes he hated all the people who came along with the title too.  
  
"I'm sorry Youji." Aya apologized, not sounding like he meant it in the slightest. He contemplated the crusted mess his shoelaces had become and decided sitting and doing nothing would be preferable. There was a surprisingly large bloodstain across his leg. He poked at the center of it all, rewarded with a sharp brittle pain that spread up his side for a moment. Delightful.  
  
Youji started in on his pants, biting his lower lip as fabric and skin made a messy separation, skinned from numerous falls on cinder brick. In the background he could hear Aya talking, pointless things, trying to sound apologetic for things he didn't even understand himself. Youji ignored him. It was a cultivated talent, he'd discovered.  
  
"You're supposed to take your shoes off before your pants." Aya informed him helpfully as Youji discovered he was somewhat stuck. Youji rectified the problem, finally managing to strip down to his skin. He frowned at the mottled dried patterns on his skin, greenish brown patches that looked like odd tattoos or pain mottling. It wasn't so bad as long as one didn't think about what those dried smears were really constituted of.  
  
He switched the water to shower flow once it had been adjusted to a suitable temperature.  
  
"I can't stand up again right now." Another baleful remark, grudgingly this time. Aya realized he wasn't going to receive assistance and tried to lean over to undo the sodden boots rubbing his feet raw. The resulting lightheadedness almost sent him head over heels. Youji frowned and knelt to remove Aya's shoes. It felt too much of servitude to be kneeling at Aya's feet directly after having been informed he didn't even count as an important facet of Aya's life.  
  
They probably made a bizarre sight, swaying unsteadily on tired feet as they struggled to get Aya out of his firmly plastered on clothing. Youji worked on being as silent, cold and impersonal as he could. It was unsure whether or not Aya noticed, his own behavior naturally being similar.  
  
Youji's shaky hand pushed back the shower curtain. "Ladies first." He intoned mockingly. Aya frowned.  
  
Taking turns under the spray, Youji wound up alternately supporting either side of Aya, using up his rapidly dwindling energy stores. He didn't bother warning Aya before he went to work on the horrendous bandage on his leg. The longer gash had healed closed, but he could see the red lines of infection spreading up pale skin even before he'd managed to find the end of the staunching fabric. Aya gripped the washcloth bar, both to support himself and to try to divert some of the pain he pretended not to feel.  
  
"You don't have to be such an asshole." Aya gritted out after a particularly ungentle tug at the hopelessly snarled and crusted material.  
  
Youji looked up, water running down the unforgiving planes of his face, damp hair subdued to darker, clumped spirals. "Don't push it Ran." He said quietly, the name usage deliberate. He wanted a fight, but he wanted to feel guiltless. Better to passively provoke until the proper response was attained.  
  
"Don't call me Ran." Came the expected response. Two squabbling children.  
  
"You're not the first person who's ever lost someone. You're not the first one to have to suffer through some difficulties to rectify a situation that pains you personally." Youji dropped all pretences of actual, helpful medical attention. "You just make the most theatrical fuss about it. You just wind up making those most unassociated feel like shit because of it."  
  
"Because I'm just an asshole and you've all led lives full of nothing but tragedy, right?" Aya snapped back, sarcastically. "What makes you the pious advocator then?"  
  
Youji stood up, gripping Aya's upper arm so tightly his fingers sank into the flesh. "We all have bad things behind us. The rest of us get on with life as best as we can. You may be completely ignorant of all pasts but your own due to selective listening and observation, but I'm not as inverted and callous as you. Most people consider that a redeeming value. You want to bitch, think about Omi. All the people who he cared for lying to him, using him for their own ends, watching all the family he had die one by one. You think that's pleasant? Ken's not exactly the paragon of a sob-story poster-boy, but things aren't pleasant for him either. Loosing the career he loved, betrayal by his best friend. You think they don't' think about that every day? You think life's a laugh riot for them at all moments too? No. They just don't fucking whine about it as much as you do. Your problem isn't even dead yet, just missing."  
  
Aya stood unsteadily, mouth hanging open. This wasn't the treatment he was used to. What happened to the usual deferring attitude? "And what about you? Are you too sanctimonious to whine? I may not give a shit about other people's problems, may do my best to forget they exist, but where is the whining that should accompany your contrived misery?" The shower certainly wasn't the place he'd expected this sort of argument to start up. It seemed almost ridiculous, arguing about who had the most right to whine while they stood there, exhausted, dripping and naked. Ridiculous or not, that didn't mean he was going to back down. Pride had to be considered, after all.  
  
There was a moment of almost painful silence. Youji looked down, mouth twisting as he tried to refrain from saying things, from lashing out physically, from saying anything he'd regret. More silence as he tried to formulate the right things in his mind. This was nothing he wanted to think about. Coping meant forgiving and forgetting. His eyes closed hopelessly. He was no more willing to talk about things dead and gone than Aya was. She was gone and he wouldn't filthy her memories by dragging them into this pointless argument, treading across treasured memories of smiles and laughter.  
  
"Forget it Aya. You're right. Your life is so hard. None of us mere mortals could ever comprehend your suffering. Forgive my impertinence." For a few overwhelming seconds the knot in his throat tightened and he thought he was going to have to cry, too strung out by events to cope. The sensation passed. It usually did. He shrugged and knelt to resume a gentler disentangling of the sodden bandage.  
  
"Youji?"  
  
"I'll get the top layer of our skin clean and as long as your leg isn't still bleeding copiously we can switch things to a bath so you won't have to stand any longer." Youji announced in a false, bright tone. It even grated on his nerves. It was better than thinking about things and getting all choked up again. A relationship of convenience such as theirs needed no real emotions thrown into the mix. As comfortable as things were, he'd forgotten it was all supposed to be a temporary fix. Not a mistake he was going to make again for a very long while.  
  
"Youji?" Aya asked again, hesitant.  
  
"That's my name, don't wear it out." He smiled, baring his teeth, regretting even the consideration of baring his soul. His past was his own. It was an established knowledge by this point that no one wanted to think about. It was better that way. He removed the last bits of once white gauze and made Aya step out of the spray, pale hands on his shoulders for balance. "This is not good at all. I hope Omi's doing better, because someone needs to do something about this mess." The bullet holes were mostly crusted over by sickly yellow scabs, the underside of the bandage-stained with all colors of bodily fluids. "Not good at all." He felt the skin around the wound, unsure what to make of the differing textures, but knowing they couldn't be good, a hypothesis the heat radiating from Aya's skin helped to support.  
  
"You waited up all night for me?" Aya's eyebrows drew together, expression puzzled. Another delayed reaction response. Maybe it really did take Aya longer to process things than other people when it didn't involve him. "Why?"  
  
"I don't know." Youji answered, voicing an almost hysterical laugh. "I think a bath would be a bad idea right now. I need five more minutes to get that crap out of my hair, and then we'll stagger back downstairs and see what can be done about that infection." He changed tracks.  
  
"I'm sorry." Aya said again, sounding like he meant it this time. Youji didn't know if he honestly cared anymore.  
  
**************  
  
Facial masks are weird, aren't they? They're all cold and tingly when they're drying, and then you can't move your goddamned face! What would I do without my mushy, tubed friends? -hugs facial mask tubes- Gah. Give me happy e-mails! Darkhunter@ijustdontcare.com or akainobaka@mchsi.com ! -hugs random people- WOOT WOOT! 


	10. Chapter Ten

-twiddles thumbs- My head is full of moth-seraphs. -deadpan- ^______^  
  
**************  
  
Youji kicked the bathroom door open, cool air rushing in like a punishing breath of winter, raising goose bumps on his still-damp skin. He jumped back from the dark figure coming at him, dropping Aya onto his ass in the process.  
  
"Took you long enough." It snapped, breezing past and slamming the door shut.  
  
"There won't be much hot water left, you know." Youji told the wooden panel, not to warn Fate out of the kindness of his heart, but mostly as a form of gloating. Spiteful bitch. "I'll get you to our room and drop you off there. I'll see if Omi's up to some impromptu doctoring." He leaned down to help the befuddled redhead up, readjusting the towel they had wrapped around the blood leaking leg. "If not, you're stuck with what I can vaguely recall from any number of bad detective novels I've read involving the treating of injuries."  
  
Aya didn't even grimace, another sign indicating how badly off he was. It didn't occur to Youji to feel guilty this time. Hey, even Youji Kudou could be a frigid bitch when the situation called for it. That was another cultivated talent.  
  
The two wobbled down the hallway, headed towards a welcome relief for their shaky legs. Aya drooped down into a boneless pile on the bed, eyes closing to shut out unwanted vertigo.  
  
"I'll be back." Youji told him, pulling on clean clothing, and his other pair of boots.  
  
He wasn't. Aya lay in an exhausted daze as a fuzzy eyed Omi came to poke and prod at him, later joined by a smiling woman he felt he should know from somewhere. He was certain the names she kept referring to him as were meant to be derogatory, but he couldn't bring himself to care. His eyes closed when he could no longer keep them fixed and unblinking on the ceiling.  
  
"Let him sleep." Omi whispered softly to Fate, backing towards the door. She smiled benevolently and patted him gently on his sore head, following suit.  
  
"So, how long have you been following Ko-ishi?" Omi asked out in the hallway.  
  
"Through a million lives." She smiled sagely, willing to leave it at that.  
  
"So, how long would this lifetime be, then?" Omi tilted his head to the side.  
  
Fate paused, hemming and hawing over the internal decision to answer. "A decade of this life. I'm not THAT old." She fluffed up the ends of her hair with a coy expression, still failing to look younger than her late thirties.  
  
"Only a decade?"  
  
"I traveled over the goddamned world to hunt him down." She spat, angry again. " You think it's easy to integrate yourself into any given nations crime world and then just extricate yourself the moment you feel you're wasting your time? It was hard, unpleasant work, but someone has to keep at it." A deep sigh, a pause while she waited for praise and received none. She huffed for a moment or two before relenting. "So, you and brown-head stupid-boy fuck?"  
  
Omi sucked in a surprised breath and choked on his own spit. "What would -hack- make you think that?" He nervously combed his fingers through his bangs, awaiting an explanation.  
  
Fate snorted. "I thought so. Why don't you find yourself someone with at least a handful of working brain cells left? I have heard few who can speak so many words and still say so little." She laughed at Ken, ignoring Omi's frowning.  
  
"I have more than a handful of working brain cells." Ken politely informed her as she reached the bottom of the stairs. "And I still haven't gotten a single goddamned useful word out of you. Who the hell are you and what are you doing here?"  
  
Fate smiled pityingly at Omi and smoothed down the shirt she'd borrowed without authorization from Youji's wardrobe. "Kudou dresses like a woman." She informed them, pointing to the carefully tailored lines of the button down top. "Does he fuck with you too?"  
  
While Ken spit out his mouthful of coffee in truly inspired coughing fit, she slipped back into her shoes and left through the kitchen window, humming under her breath. "Don't wait up for me." She waved one hand at them, standing knee deep in shrubbery.  
  
"Omi. We're all going crazy and something horrible is going to happen." Ken flopped down on an unforgiving wooden chair, hand to his head. "How much do you want to bet she didn't even exist, whoever the fuck she was? We're all having a group hallucination."  
  
"She calls herself 'Fate', and as far as I've been able to gather from her, she's been hunting Ko-ishi down from day one. He's supposedly some sort of evil, immortal being bent on 'wreaking havoc on all he surveys'." Omi mocked her accent for the last few words, then immediately became shamefaced. "She's probably a little, well, a lot crazy, but she means well."  
  
"Is Aya okay?" Ken decided it simply wasn't worth thinking about. She was gone now, and she obviously didn't mean too much harm, having helped bring Aya back home.  
  
"He would be if we could make him stay in bed for a week or so. Every time he starts to get better, he pushes too hard and takes a huge leap backwards. I'm starting to wonder if he really is trying to cause himself permanent injury. I don't think his leg can take much more before the damage is irrevocable, and then all that crippled-for-life crap he keeps bitching about will become a reality."  
  
"So, get Youji to talk some sense into him. Aya talks a good game, but he does trust Youji. There are three of us. We can all gang up on him and talk him into being a bit more sensible. We three can do all the outside work, trying to locate Ko-ishi, or the person pretending to be him, and Aya can heal up. Tell him we want him to guard the house if that's what it takes to keep him inside."  
  
Omi shrugged apologetically, mouth stretched in an unconscious grimace. "Youji's gone. He said he had some important research to do and that we shouldn't worry. He'd be back when it was all done."  
  
"Sounds bad."  
  
Gnawing on his lower lip in an unconscious gesture of thought, Omi set water on the stove to heat, fluttering from cabinet to cabinet, doing nothing and a bit of everything both at the same time.  
  
"You okay?" Ken walked over, put a calloused palm to Omi's forehead. "You don't feel hot." He frowned pensively.  
  
"Just a bit disoriented." Omi stepped forward, resting his weight against Ken's solid, warm frame. "My head still hurts a bit, too." He admitted, swaying back onto his own feet with a tired sigh. "I'm just going to make some tea and sit back for a few minutes."  
  
"Go sit out on the couch. I'll take care of it." He ushered a perfectly willing, if not slightly guilty, Omi out of the kitchen, straightening up all the implements Omi had aimlessly twitched out of place. He pulled up a chair to watch the water, ignoring the proverb telling him that the water wouldn't boil as long as he sat and watched it. It always did, it just seemed to take longer.  
  
Fate crawled back through the window, scattering leaves all over the counter.  
  
"We have a fucking front door." Ken snapped at her irritably.  
  
"Your home is being watched. It would be a misfortune if they were to discover my involvement."  
  
"Anyone even remotely competent would have spies posted on all sides. I'm willing to bet that they already know you're here, and in fact are probably out there sniggering about your idiotic method if entrance. Use the door next time, and go clean up those leaves." He pointed imperiously, starting to reach that first stepping-stone towards actual anger. He glanced back at the stove, little bubbles surfacing in the stainless steel pot's water. Of course. It WOULD wait until he'd looked away.  
  
"Where is the cute blonde one?"  
  
Ken struggled to keep a snarl out of his voice. "My cute blonde one, thank you very much. Why don't you go back out the fucking window you came in through?" He turned the heat under the burner up, deliberately brushing against Fate as he walked past to get a mug, wanting to intimidate her with his greater height and bulk, trying to mentally project the growing ire into her mind. The world would be so much easier if everyone were telepathic.  
  
"So you do fuck." She nodded, sounding as if she'd just had a childhood suspicion confirmed: there was no Tooth Fairy; small children, no matter how hopeful, cannot fly; and oh, yeah, Ken and Omi fuck.  
  
Ken ground his teeth together and ignored her. He didn't know what shallow gene pool Youji had dragger her out of, but he would be more than grateful if she were suddenly overwhelmed by homesickness and decided to return. The boiling water hissed as he poured it over the tea bag, he overcame fantasies of flinging the scalding pot at Fate only with great difficulty. It was astounding how greatly she got on his nerves simply by being in the room.  
  
Sneaking a quick look at the still closed kitchen door, Ken popped open the empty medicine vile he'd been storing the ground up pain killers he'd been slipping Omi, tipped a few pinches into the translucent golden beverage.  
  
Fate watched blankly as he pushed past her again, elbowing open the swinging door as he carefully steadied the hot ceramic cup. Omi looked up, eyes bleary and leaning more and more towards total incomprehension.  
  
"Tired?" He set the tea down in front of Omi on the end table, leaning over to kiss the top of Omi's head. Omi smiled, helplessly blinking his eyes against pending sleep.  
  
"No, I'm not tired. I'll stay up for a while and keep an eye out for intruders while you and Aya get some rest." Omi ruined the brave front by yawning, a huge, jaw-cracking betrayal by his body.  
  
"Drink your tea and go lie down." Ken clenched his fists, wanting to take up as much of Omi's personal space as possible, but unable to in the sudden self-conscious rut brought in by Fate's presence and crude statements. He didn't want her knowing him, making stupid assumptions about things not of her concern.  
  
Every single drop was gone before Omi consented to go upstairs for a lie-down, still adorably adamant about his state of awareness. "I'm not tired at all. I feel fine." He murmured, even as his eyes closed, Ken tucking the blankets up under his chin.  
  
"How cute." Fate pretended to gush as he gently shut their bedroom door behind him.  
  
"Shut up, bitch." He frowned, upset by his having been angered to the point of using language he abhorred, unable to react in any other manner. If this kept up he just might wind up a tried and true misogynist; guilt by association for the women of the world.  
  
"Do you know where Youji might have gone?" He finally asked, unable to think of a better way to fill the sudden silence.  
  
"Any number of places." She helpfully supplied. "There are at least fifteen places he could be. Would you like me to list them all?"  
  
"With a name like Fate, I'd think you were supposed to be some sort of oracle." Scorn.  
  
Fate decided she was through talking with an unbeliever. An impolite unbeliever at that.  
  
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -  
  
Halfway across town, Youji lay unconscious at the bottom of a darkened stairwell, blood staining his hair and the roughly hewn cement beneath his cheek.  
  
**************  
  
I know I promised you smut, but I'm getting there. With one person from each couple down, intercourse appears to have become a lesser priority. I'm actually, oddly enough, going to try for a Ken/Omi lemon next, depending on how I have things progress, but don't worry, there will still be tons of Youji and Aya. I do like those two better -puts fingers to lips-, but SHHHH, don't tell any of the HUGELY avid Ken and Omi fans, they might lynch me. -laughs- Or not. More to come though. I'll do my best to keep plugging away. Give me feedback! Give me e-mails! I'd greatly appreciate it!!!! darkhunter@ijustdontcare.com or akainobaka@mchsi.com That's me! 


	11. Chapter Eleven

Eck! Tea tastes horribly nasty, but I've always felt a fun part of adulthood involved drinking icky tasting things for the sake of being able to say so. -throws her mug of lemon tea at the wall- Damn you tea! I even put honey in you!!! -continues to sip the foul beverage even as she types- Hard to write a real lemon when all you can think about is how gross your mouth now tastes. - goes away to whine elsewhere-  
  
**************  
  
Stupid? Yeah, Youji was willing to call it that. Why? Because it was. Going back to Cobarde's ransacked, blood splattered home was a bad idea from the start. The man was fucking dangling above his kitchen table from meat hooks, the skin of his chest spread out like gory, leathery butterfly wings. Even looking at him for those few brief seconds had been enough to unnerve him and get the paranoia jumpstarted.  
  
One had to wonder what the next step might be for the sort of person who would be willing to mutilate another human being that badly. Youji killed for a living, but he was an advocator of the merciful death. The thought of staying and wallowing in the excessive torture of another living thing seemed inexorably wrong.  
  
Even as he stepped out of Ken and Omi's borrowed car, almost wishing Ken had a new motorbike he could have liberated instead, Youji could feel the wrongness of the air. Even a few minutes breezing along with nothing but rushing air to either side tended to make him easier with the world, carefree. How could he feel anything but invincible with nothing but a few thin layers of leather between his body and the unforgiving, rushing pavement. Flying.  
  
The door still swung open to his touch, the gore within undiscovered by anyone willing to take action. The bad weather outside had blown papers all around the interior halls, knocked over delicate decorative fixtures and lamps alike. It felt deserted, empty and soulless. A thorough, careful search through the front rooms revealed nothing of interest. No important papers, no personal information, nada.  
  
Back towards the kitchen, waiting every second for a reeking, stumbling form to barrel out of the kitchen rearing back and rending him limb from limb. The dead stay dead, Youji knew, but in situations like this, with all the wrongness coursing through the air, forbidden thoughts did tend to surface with a vengance. Improbable thoughts as well.  
  
Holding his breath against the newly blooming stench of rot, Youji dashed past the kitchen, mind full of childhood monsters and bogeymen. None appeared, to his intense relief. On to the bedrooms now. Searching through the important bits of a dead man's life. It somehow felt dirtier picking over his physical memories than it would to slip up behind him in the dark and slide thread thin wire around his throat until it ran with blood. Pawing through the soulless husks final possessions, he found an odd keycard, tucked in the bottom of a drawer full of socks and happily patterned boxers. It made him think of the plastic rectangles used to open up hotel rooms.  
  
"This looks important." He stated aloud, trying to fill the unearthly silence. It was one thing to have legitimate prey to stalk, another to creep around in unfriendly noiselessness. Entirely different. He found himself glancing over his shoulder on an increasingly frequent basis. No signs of anything important in the bedroom either. That left one more room; one he would certainly rather avoid.  
  
"Do it for Aya then." A decent enough incentive as long as he didn't remind himself of their earlier conversation. Sort of demeaning, to do unsettling grunt work for someone who callously informed you that you were of no importance in their already lonely life. But Aya did need someone to be there for him. If his sister was missing, then that left Youji to play the sole center of Aya's destructive universe until the comatose body could once again lie in the sterilized shrine of a hospital, worshipped by her accompanying metallic companions whirring softly in the background.  
  
"I hope you try and appreciate me more, you ungrateful son of a bitch." Youji spoke out loud again, steeling his nerves with fond images of Aya, those few rare smiles, one of those occasional days when both could do no wrong and things were idyllic and peaceful. He didn't want to go back into that kitchen, didn't want to creep around the suspended body, holding his breath out of fear. Even his feet dragged in protest as he headed down that suddenly impossibly long hallway, trying to stop the inevitable.  
  
"I hope you appreciate this." He peeked around the doorframe, noting the exact location of all furniture, accounting for the angle of every dangling limb. He was the same. The room was the same. Even the blood puddles were the same size, though they'd gone from congealed glistening lakes to dried, crusty splotches.  
  
Dead people don't move. Youji kept repeating that mental refrain to himself as he searched around the perimeter of the kitchen, looking for something that matched the odd key he'd found in the bedroom. There had to be something. One-Eye told him that Cobarde always worked from his home, no other properties were listed under any of his aliases. It had to be here. SOMETHING had to be here for him to find. He'd promised himself he wouldn't leave until he had something concrete to take back to Aya.  
  
A white blur behind him, darting across the floor. Youji jumped back, shoulderblades against the cool front of the fridge, gun aimed at a harmless piece of paper being skittered across the floor from the breeze inviting itself in the front door. He had to stop being so goddamned jumpy. There was nothing to fear. The house was empty; the atrocity in the room with him well and truly dead.  
  
A random thought fluttering across his mind. Check the fridge. If Youji had papers he wanted hidden and he knew he was being stalked and possibly faced his own death, the fridge would be the first place he'd put them, the last place anyone would look. Bated breath, the soft sound as the suction holding the door closed gave up.  
  
He let the breath out, explosive with disappointment. Nothing but food. Plain, boring food. In a fit of brief, stress related rage, Youji swept an arm across the shelf, knocking jars and wrapped food packages to the floor.  
  
"Oh fuck, jackpot!" He breathed, staring at the metal panel adorning the back wall of the fridge. Time for the moment of truth. He reached forward, pried up the panel with blunt fingernails. "Jackpot times a thousand." A single key slot, surrounded by odd symbols.  
  
Youji barely managed to hang onto the keycard, the fridge sliding over on unseen tracks the second the mechanics spit the card back out. He sucked on sore fingers, watching the fridge continue it's bizarre movement. Within seconds, the true purpose of the hidden machinery was revealed. The faint outlines of a large rectangle was clearly seen against the wall-paper. A door. A door with a similar key-slot. Jackpot times infinity.  
  
Dark stairs greeted him, the pastel flowered paper on the door contrasting horribly with the dank, filthy path leading downwards. The sneaky little bastard was smarter than previously assumed. A hidden underground office, perhaps?  
  
As his feet touched the third step down, the door he'd left to swing shut behind him did so with an exuberance that could only have been planned, smashing into him from behind and knocking him head over heels down into darkness. Definitely a stupid idea to come here, Youji thought again, eyes shuttering against the image of his own blood running away from his face across dirty concrete.  
  
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -  
  
"Mmm, 'lo there." Omi muttered sleepily, pulling Ken down under the body-warmed covers around him, tilting his chin up for a kiss.  
  
Ken laughed and covered Omi's mouth. "I don't want to kiss you, sleep-breath."  
  
Omi pouted. "I've only been asleep an hour, and I brushed my teeth before I went to bed." Ken relented and leaned down for a kiss, letting the baking heat of Omi's arms loop around his neck. It started gentle; soft lips brushing, the wet heat of velvet tongues languidly exploring familiar territory, ended with heaving chests and bitten lips.  
  
"Shit." Ken panted, head lowered to rest forehead-to-forehead with Omi's.  
  
"Wouldn't 'fuck' be the better expletive to insert at this point?" Omi teasingly ran the tip of his pink tongue across the glistening expanse of his lower lip. He smiled. "Though maybe you could insertions in some other pleasurable form?" Just a helpful little suggestion.  
  
Time to give up and get out of here, Ken decided, closing his eyes. There was no refusing Omi when he started with that cute dirty talking. Not good to engage in sexual activity with someone recovering from a bad head wound. "You go back to sleep." He brushed a forcibly gentle kiss across Omi's forehead, trying to steady his breathing.  
  
"Do I really look that horrible right now?" Omi self-consciously rubbed at his hair, "I know we've been busy and I haven't really been with it enough to get a shower in, I could get up right now and-"  
  
"'Sokay. You don't look bad at all, a little unkempt yeah, but neither of us really has had much time for personal hygiene." To prove his point, he laced his fingers through Omi's hair, ignoring the stiff blood spikes beneath his fingertips. Omi tentatively smiled back. "You don't mind?"  
  
"It's your blood, isn't it? I've had worse things on my skin." He kissed the silk fringes of blonde eyelashes, trailed down one side of a delicate jaw. Omi sighed in contentment, kneading the back of Ken's neck like a fatigued cat.  
  
"That feels nice." Soft whispered encouragements, neither sure who was murmuring what. Ken turned the soft kisses into the gnawing of teeth, the rasp of two days worth of stubble framing smooth skin, framing well-received nibbles. Omi tilted his head to the side, nimble fingers sliding down to work the end of Ken's t-shirt out of his pants, pulling the fabric up to tangle around Ken's shoulders and bent arms.  
  
"What's gotten into you?" Ken finished the job for him, pulling the dark shirt up and over his head, his hair a mess of tangles in its wake. "Not that I'm complaining..." he sighed as Omi homed in on his nipples. Ken's breath caught in his throat as pink lips trailed down his chest, traced the curves of his ribcage, the stretch of skin between hipbones.  
  
Footsteps clattering down the hallway outside their locked door, the sound of the bathroom door creaking open further down.  
  
"Fate?" Ken guessed, irked at the interruption.  
  
"I don't think the powers that be are working to interrupt our sex." Omi looked up, startled.  
  
Ken sighed. "The person, Fate." He flopped back down from his startled sitting position. "Though with her timing, who knows?"  
  
Omi slithered back up the bared expanse of Ken's chest, seizing Ken's mouth with his own for a kiss that was everything wet and hot and then some. Yes, Omi certainly did have talents all his own. Caught up, muffled moans Ken didn't realize were coming from his mouth until Omi untangled their mouths to comment on it with a wicked little smile.  
  
"I'll show you 'incredibly loud moaning', brat!" Ken ducked under the covers, keeping their shared warmth trapped, finding and removing Omi's boxers in the dark. Omi shivered, pulling the blankets up over his head, ensconcing them both in a soothing sea of dark sheets and soft, unseen skin.  
  
Busy hands tried to canvas as many square inches of Omi's skin as possible while Ken occupied his own mouth with a more dexterous task, Omi's knuckles harshly kneading at the back of Ken's neck still. "Nn, more." Back arching slightly, Omi squirmed for more attention.  
  
Ken slid his palms down until they encountered the firm curves of warm thighs, fingers pressing against that smooth, living flesh. Omi liked it rough sometimes, complained if things didn't elevate to his expectations, retaliated in kind if he found his full satisfaction to be lacking. Ken could never decide if he liked that, hated it or simply could not live without those pouting lips coming down to bite his shoulder when the hands on his body were too gentle, when the thrusts were too slow. It wasn't worth debating; not when Omi was wrapping slim legs around his waist, urging him to slide into perfect warmth, the blankets slowly falling away and winding up on the sanded wood floor, draping over the sides of the mattress.  
  
Omi was making the most delightful sounds underneath him, hips lifting up into the harsh rhythm they created between their bodies. Distantly he heard someone pounding on the wall, heard Aya's irked shout for silence; ignored it.  
  
"I want it harder." Omi breathed against his neck, hands turning to claws down Ken's back, chest heaving against his, sweat slicking everything. Ken readily obliged, teeth gritting together those last few seconds as he forced himself to hold out longer than Omi. "Ah." All the breath hissed out of that fragile body as Omi tightened like electricity beneath him, muscles shuddering around him. Ken pushed his forehead into the perfect space between Omi's neck and shoulder, surrendering his senses to the mind-rending climax Omi always managed to elicit from him.  
  
Aya finally stopped pounding on the wall by their door as Ken and Omi quieted, the two now collapsed in a sated, tangled heap. Omi pressed a few sleepy kisses to Ken's collarbone before dropping immediately into the sleep Ken had interrupted a bare twenty minutes before. Ken tried to hook the blankets back up over them using only his free foot and his left arm, careful not to move Omi. He gave up when the top layer wouldn't go past his lower thigh, leaving them out of reach for his grasping hand.  
  
Omi nuzzled closer, rubbing his cheek against the skin of Ken's chest. Ken kissed the top of his sleeping head, lying back with helpless smile on his lips.  
  
**************  
  
I am a big fan of the "four paragraph lemon". A bit of detail, a few things hinted at and then POOF, done. You guys were lucky enough to get a few more than four paragraphs, so be grateful. Now, for Youji? What has befallen poor bloody-head boy? -blinks- Is it me or are all my characters bleeding from the head. Maybe I'll give Fate some sort of stigmata so someone can bleed from a new location. -ducks the missiles discharged from the Bible Belt- Nyah! Anyway, give me e-mails and feedback! Darkhunter@ijustdontcare.com or akainobaka@mchsi.com Woot, woot!, nine out of ten doctors recommend feedback as the best incentive for overworked fanfiction writers! So, hop to it! 


	12. Chapter Twelve

Yay for Dark Hunter. Woo hoo. I'm my own fanclub -waves dippy little flag around- All I need now are pom-poms and white sneakers. Oh yes, and also crack. *checks pockets* All out, damn it! *goes to eat spoonfuls of peanut butter* Peanut butter is ALMOST like crack! Peter Pan makes it! ^_^  
  
**************  
  
Youji was dreaming. He thought. He hoped. His head ached abominably; his hair accually seemed to be glued to the surface beneath his temple; outer extremities numbing with cold, bare skin equally chilled from the flooring beneath him. This definitely shouldn't be real. If anything, he should wake up any moment to find himself warm and cozy, curled up in bed with Aya. He couldn't explain the headache away. What had he done yesterday to cause him pain?  
  
His eyebrows drew together in a frown as he shakily propped himself up, searching around the dim room. Some sort of computer lab. Bulky machines lined the walls, similar in appearance to those first science-fiction fabled "super computers" from the seventies, their glowing screens providing the only illumination in the room. As his mind pulled the past few conscious hours together for him; he realized those computers were in all likelihood capable of far more complicated things than a game of solitaire.  
  
Another worried thought flashing through his mind. The slamming door, the dead man? Youji was on his feet, whirling about within a second, disregarding the harsh stabbing of agony bolting through his skull. How long was he out? A minute? A day? Had the dead man retaliated against his invasion? Was he down here now? The thought of a living assailant never even crossed him mind, occupied as he was with his new obsessive fear.  
  
Silence throughout the room, no movement visible in its dim, yellow-lit corners. He searched for a light switch, fist clenched at his side, ready for a swift attack should need be. At the foot of the rough staircase, a covered panel. There was no obvious method of release save a card shaped slit. He turned to scour the floor for his fallen key-card, sure it'd fallen with him.  
  
"Ah-ha!" He chased it across the dusty floor; his short nails finding little purchase to scrape it up. The metal cover popped open to reveal a row of labeled switches. The relief stealing through his body was immediate, the bare hundred-watt bulb chasing away any suspicious shadows. Ko-Ishi the light eater wasn't here, or he would have popped out with some witty rejoinder by now. No dead men either.  
  
The large computers only covered two walls and their adjoining corner. The remaining one, left of the staircase-wall braced a row of filing cabinets, shiny and professional as could be. They looked humorously out of place next to the big cheesy machinery and the Spartan lighting and decoration. Focus on the goal. Find Aya's sister. Find information about Ko-Ishi, or the being claiming their fallen foes name.  
  
He pulled open the top sliding file holder on the nearest filing cabinet. Neatly alphabetized names greeted him: Aburon, Chase; Akalia, Sakura; Andrata, Michel. On and on, A through B in the first file holder. A quick perusal through a random folder showed him the entire credit history of a wealthy man; sited the dealings he'd had with Cobarde; a handwritten sheet of legal paper listed available hostages to threaten with should the need arise. Thorough.  
  
Youji shot the stairwell a quick glance; almost afraid the dead man would make his appearance now, as he dug through the man's most treasured belongings. Why they weren't all kept in the form of a computer file Youji wasn't sure. Maybe Cobarde liked having several copies of important things and if Youji found himself feeling particularly ambitious, he could find a way to get Omi back here. Time to stop lollygagging about. Find what you can, get gone.  
  
"Ko-Ishi, please be under Ko-Ishi." Youji breathed as he tried to center himself in the massive alphabet before him. How many files would 'K' have? Did Ko-Ishi have a real name he'd be listed under? Youji was screwed if that was the case. "Hah!" A triumphant sound from his mouth before he could stop himself. Another darting glance around him still revealed the surroundings to be clear of any living or unliving beings.  
  
He tucked the folder under his arm without looking at it. Paused in thought for a moment before heading for the beginning middle section of the alphabet, finding two files he'd suspected would be there. Fujimiya, Aya. Fujimiya, Ran. Those went under his arm. The silence was getting to him. Time to get going.   
  
Youji now knew valuable information existed for their use. He could come back with the rest of Weiss later; remove the stiff from his hooks, get Omi set up in front of the computer, go through the files without the fear hastened carelessness. He wouldn't be afraid to come back here with Aya. He couldn't exactly picture those cold violet eyes widening with fear upon seeing the gruesome tableau in the kitchen. Aya might even find it to be amusing; a gruesome sort of new-aged art. He was funny like that.  
  
Time to brave the stairs. He adjusted the slipping folders against his side, all filled to bursting with sheets of paper. The plastic card in his hand was slippery with nervous sweat; Youji had a tense moment where he thought he was going to drop his key between step-gaps into unreachable depths, trapped to starve in this prison.  
  
The door opened to the kitchen; afternoon's fading to dusk leaving the kitchen shadowy and gray. Youji wondered if he really was jinxed somehow. All that could be wrong and creepy somehow always came to be when he was involved. Fortunately, the muted light still revealed the corpse in its former position, still the gruesome mobile. It wasn't until after he'd left the room in his wake, breathing a sigh of relief, that bloodshot, decaying eyes rolled in drying sockets, intent on the doorway.  
  
Youji couldn't get out of that house fast enough, slamming the door behind him, trusting the poor visibility to keep him unnoticed by nosy neighbors. Strapping the bundle of information down in the basket on Ken's motorbike, Youji was gone without a glance back. So, yeah, riding a motorcycle with a recently banged-up head... not smart. He'd be the first to throw aside any pretensions of common sense.  
  
"Hello? Anyone home?" Youji pulled out a length of wire when no sounds greeted him. He frowned, peering about their front room. There was a breathing lump of blankets on the couch. If Fate was snoozing down here, did that mean all were asleep now? Why hadn't she woken up to his buoyant shout? He tiptoed over and flicked back the edge of the blanket. Fate blinked sleepily up at him, eyes crinkled up. She looked like a middle-aged goblin for a moment, face smushed up by the pillow.  
  
"Gah!" Youji jumped back. She frowned.  
  
"What the fuck was that for? Can't you see I'm trying to sleep? Go upstairs for ficky-ficky with your red head boy and leave me in peace." She yanked the flannel blanket out of his hand and pulled it back up over her head. Youji moved on, officially weirded out.  
  
Up the stairs, quietly now. It wouldn't do to wake up those who deserved sleep. Hell, talk about deserving sleep... Two days running now, more if Aya was going to go frigid on him and tell him he couldn't sleep in the room. He sure as hell wouldn't share the couch with Fate, and Ken and Omi were due for a little privacy of their own.  
  
The door decided not to creak for once as he tried his damndest to keep all sounds at that exact frequency that Aya was able to sleep peacefully through. Reaching that happy medium of stealth and harmless shuffling relied more on luck than any skill on his part. The object before him, hidden by the dark fouled up any last attempts at quiet, tripping him onto the floor. "Shit, shit, shit, shit, SHIT!" Helpless curses as he alternately gripped his knee and his head, sprawled on the floor, a dull sick feeling spreading out from the pit of his stomach to match the throbbing of his bruised bones. A never-ending day of hurting.  
  
"There's a chair near the door, be careful." Low, acerbic tones as Aya propped himself up on one elbow, scratching a match to light the oil lamp on the end table.  
  
Youji, swallowed hard, trying not to vomit. "Are you alright?" Aya pushed the blankets back and tried to stand when no angry reply was forthcoming. He barely made it past sitting. "Your hair is bloody."  
  
Gritted teeth, stomach well and truly lurching now. Back on his feet, lurching down the hallway. Youji only hoped he could make it to the bathroom in time. Not fun cleaning up puke in the dark. 'Specially your own. He genuflected in the dark before the porcelain throne as the last vestiges of nausea passed, the contents of his stomach still firmly ensconced within the proper organs. Nothing like a head wound to bring up old meals for a visit.  
  
"Youji?" A soft rapping on the door, a light as it swung open beneath Aya's hand. He limped across the small room, leaning heavily on the marble counter. "What is it with you and excessive throwing up."  
  
"Didn't throw up."  
  
"You okay?" Aya asked again.  
  
"No."  
  
Gritting his teeth, Aya knelt down on the faded tile, feeling almost as ill as Youji for a few excruciating moments. "What happened, where have you been all this time?" He slumped back against the counter and straightened his legs out in front of him in one quick motion, trying to condense all the pain into one tight moment.  
  
A cool almost lifeless grasp on Youji's wrist. For a moment the stagnant, fetid air of Cobarde's kitchen was on him in full, the hand on his arm red veined with skin that slid over the bones like an over-ripe peach. Aya's hurt indigo gaze turned downwards as Youji jerked away from his touch.   
  
"I'd leave right now if you wanted, but I think I'm sort of stuck right now." Aya gave the candle on the floor a tight, rueful almost-smile, pallid cheeks glowing with embarrassment in the flame's luminosity.  
  
"No, even if you could I wouldn't ask you to." Youji rested his burning forehead against the cool side of the tub, craving the cool straightforward existence of inanimate matter. Sure, being shot was painful, being burnt and tortured and abused in any number of ways: also not fun, but feeling queasy was so fucking unendurable, sandpaper on that restless connection in your spine, your nerve endings and tolerance.  
  
"Where have you been?" Switching roles. "You were gone all day." Aya realized he was repeating himself. It didn't matter anyway. Words held no value. Slowly, so Youji had time to shift back and save them both from more hurt feelings, Aya reached forward, carefully lifting a strand of rust tinted hair away from Youji's forehead. "You trying to one up Omi in some sort of unofficial Head Bleeding Contest?"  
  
"When you talked to One-Eye, he sent you to two people, that bitch staying in our house now, Fate, and a man called Cobarde. I don't know if you went to see him or not, but he's now very dead. He has a hidden room under his house full of files on all the people he's dealt with." Slow halting words, forced out against the taste of the bitter saliva flooding his mouth again. Still was the best, no sound and the sickness stepped it down a notch or two.  
  
"That's where you went? What were you looking for? Assuming I'd already passed through before OR after his death, what was it you thought you could find that I hadn't already?"  
  
Youji swallowed again, the lump in his throat one of disappointment. All of that for nothing. Aya already knew about the room, had probably 'persuaded' the man take him down, and seen all that Youji had. So much for an affection winning surprise. And that's all it had been, some sort of eleventh-hour attempt to win Aya's praise, his gratitude. Stupid, very stupid.  
  
"If I help you get up again, will you please go away?" Desperate to be alone now with the crushing misery.  
  
"No." Aya crossed his arms. "You're upset now because it wasn't Omi you were trying to one up, it was me. That's not what this is all about. I want my sister back; I appreciate anything you do to help, but don't do stupid shit and get your head knocked in because you're trying to impress someone, especially me. I'm not worth impressing. I crawl around in sewers on the advice of little hyperactive women who call themselves "The Striking Cobra" when they appear to be all but harmless. What's admirable about that?" He slapped a palm down onto the floor.  
  
"You obviously didn't see her arsenal if you're still calling her harmless." Youji changed the subject.  
  
"You want to hear something I'll kill you if you ever tell anyone I admitted? If you hadn't shown up I'd most likely be very dead right now, drowned in a lake of muck in the sewers. If there's a score being kept right now, you're already in the lead."  
  
A gap in dialogue as Youji kept silent, more deep breathes. Fuck, but it was cold out here in the real world. He wanted nothing more than to be in bed right now, something cool and nice against his head, something warm and breathing by his side to soothe the rest of his overworked body.  
  
"You feeling any better? Do I need to get Omi?"  
  
"Tell you what, I'll help you up if you'll help me up."  
  
"I help you both up if you clear off and let me use this bathroom." Fate glibly interpolated from out of the blue.  
  
"How long have you been here?" Youji pressed a hand over his eyes, thoroughly fed up and unable to do anything about it.  
  
Fate shrugged. "A while." She crossed the last of the gap and extended a hand for Aya. "You first, stupid man. Sit on floor with bad leg. Why you not stay in bed like intelligent invalid? Hmm? Because you are idiot? No need to answer so quickly, stupidhead." She caught the underside of one elbow, pulling him up with one arm, the other gripping Aya's other arm, letting him do some of the work. She staggered off with him, leaving Youji with the candle and his confused emotions. Stupid woman...  
  
"You go to see Cobarde?" Fate returned. "You see what they do to him? In all places I see that carnage, what they do to those who know what they should not. You are all best to leave the dealings to me. I get red head's sister back, trounce Ko-Ishi. No problem for you, you just stay and act as distraction." Fate nodded.  
  
"Why did they do that to his body?" Gorge rising to his throat as more mental reminders paint out the kitchen scene behind his eyelids again.  
  
Fate shrugged. "Eccentric cult thing they think is much funny. You not worry. Only for traitors, every other person be bludgeoned to death, be less of a mess." Fate upped the wattage, trying to blind him with one of her truly frightening grins/grimaces.  
  
"Why does your ability to speak grammatically correct sentences in Japanese degenerate every time I talk to you?"  
  
"You just rubbing off on me I guess. I go away soon, get more smart for my head." She smiled at him. "You hit your head, feel sick? How many fingers do I hold up?" She laughed. "What happen to your head, you remembering?"  
  
"Fell down a flight of stairs."  
  
"Very stupid." Came the benediction. "You feel confusing? You tired or dizzy?"  
  
"Nope, just sick."  
  
"You be okay dokay in a short time. Just need rest and heal. Come, stupid red head will be getting lonely, you can argue in bedroom so I can use bathroom." Fate shook a warning finger. "You make vomit on this shirt it is your problem, I take it from your closet. Says 'dry clean only' on tag. You vomit, you pay for cleaning."  
  
"Well, just so long as we're clear on that point..." Deadpan.  
  
**************  
  
-goes away to eat shiny tinfoil after she cooks chicken nuggets on it- Give me feedback, tell me I should actually keep working on this project instead of sleeping at night or watching Conan O' Brian. Darkhunter@ijustdontcare.com or akainobaka@mchsi.com You know the drill. No feedback, no updates. NYAH! 


	13. Chapter Thirteen

HAAHAAHAAA!!!!! I love South Park!! "Hahaha! Butters doesn't know how to make semen come out of his body!" -laughs- Gods, I need to stop watching Comedy Central while I do computer things. HAHA!! SOUTH PARK!!!!  
  
**************  
  
"Days just keep getting longer and longer don't they? Where is one supposed to fit sleep in now?" Youji griped, stealing Aya's pillow to protect his own head from the sunlight attempting to sear his retinas. Aya punched him in the ribs.  
  
"Mine," he proclaimed, stealing the pillow and rolling over, taking most of the blankets with him.  
  
"Mm." Youji turned with him, snuggling up against his back, comfortable and sleepy. "I had this weird dream."  
  
"Don't tell me about it."  
  
"There were like these people, wearing war paint and feathers, and they were having this huge party inside a tent, with tribal things 'n' everything, beer and drugs and all that. And this bear comes waltzing in through the door, on his hind legs you know, and he's got like a bear mullet."  
  
Aya sighed heavily, trying to tune out the pointless babbling for both of their sakes.  
  
"And all the people at the party are all bowing down and chanting at this redneck bear, and the bear goes like 'What the fuck?' and they tell him he's their great bear god and they've been waiting for him all this time. And the bear puts his paws up and tell them 'Dude, I only showed up because I heard you guys had free beer.' Then the bear was Oprah, except she wasn't Oprah, she was someone else too, from a video game I think. MegaMan, you know."  
  
"Youji."  
  
"Hmm?"  
  
"Shut up."  
  
"Okay."   
  
Aya's clandestine smile was hidden by the bunched up pillow beneath his cheek, the sun polished hair across his face further obscuring his features.  
  
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -   
  
"You still have key thing for Cobarde's hiding files?" Fate looped a friendly arm around Youji's shoulders as soon as he gimped into the kitchen. "What is wrong with your leg, stupid boy?"  
  
"Yes, and I fell over a chair in the dark. Why?"  
  
"Hmm, we all go to Cobarde's house today. Why you not turn on lights in this house. Not work in bathroom at all, you need new light bulbs?"  
  
"Faulty wiring." Ken, looking up from the newspaper, cup of coffee in hand. "We can't get it fixed no matter what we try." His face darkened as he caught sight of Youji.  
  
"I go fix." Fate strode off to work her magic.  
  
"What happened to you?" The dark haired assassin rose to his feet, face creased in concern, Omi following suit.  
  
Youji shrugged. "I made the mistake of poking around where I shouldn't have. I got knocked down some stairs."  
  
"You mean you fell." The sound of the fridge opening behind him as Aya got out the milk.  
  
"Fell, yeah, whatever." A nonchalant toe scuffing immaculate linoleum.  
  
Ken gave him a quick sideways grin to show he understood, that instantaneous camaraderie they'd always shared.  
  
"Well, you heard the lady, get ready for an outing." Hesitant glances in Aya's direction, hoping he wouldn't decline. Youji wouldn't set foot in that building again without Aya. No one else could be counted upon to refuse to get the jitters in that anomalous atmosphere. He'd had enough of frightened paranoia for this week.  
  
"Who put her in charge? This is our fight." Ken crossed his arms. "I'm not going if you're all going to defer to her like she isn't some nutcase who followed Youji home." He looked over to Youji for support. No one wants to take a stand by themselves.  
  
Youji had to look away, guilt eating at his gut and starting up a bit of that nausea from last night. No breakfast for him then. Two days without food again. At least sleep wasn't on that list anymore. Omi looked almost discomfited for a moment, shamed by Ken's inherent hostility. The expression on that guileless face hurt more than Youji's betrayal. Aya didn't even acknowledge the issue at hand.  
  
"All right." He left his cup in the sink.  
  
"What's wrong with Ken?" Omi frowned. "Why's he so against Fate?"  
  
Giving into the culpability, Youji trailed after Ken.  
  
"Stop huffing ahead. My knee's sore and I don't want to try to keep up. Can you at least let me talk first?"  
  
"I'm alone in this house." Ken stared out the window in his bedroom. "You and Aya both sided with Omi earlier, and now you're all siding against me again. She's not right, she's up to something; don't you see that?" Helpless fists clenched against his thighs.  
  
"We're all alone in the end. Even if other people don't believe you or agree with you, you have to stand firm for what you want, what you believe in. Either way, things will play out as they're destined to."  
  
"You really believe that?"  
  
"No." Youji snorted. "That's just a line of crap I read in a novel once. It's a bit true though. You can really only trust yourself, no matter how much you love and believe in someone."  
  
"I trust you, probably the one of us I trust the most, because while you can be a bit self-obsessed at times and a tad too glib for most serious situations, you listen to your hunches, you follow your emotions, and tell the truth." Ken turned around. "Why isn't your gut feelings one of dislike and suspicion? It leaks from her pores like bad perfume."  
  
"Omi likes her well enough. She likes Omi. People who like Omi can't be all that bad. He's the only one of us who hasn't been called stupid more than once or twice." A smile tugged at the corner of Youji's mouth.  
  
"That doesn't tell me what you feel about her though."  
  
Youji scanned the hallway before shutting the door, sealing them into their new atmosphere of secrets untold. "Look, there is something strange going on right now if you hadn't noticed. People are coming back from the dead for one. Cobarde was just another link in the chain, a lesser version of One-Eye, now he's hanging from his ceiling with his chest torn open, part of some cult ritual Fate says. She knows what's going on here. She told me that we should stay out of things and let her take care of it all. She's just caught up in all of this like we are. If she has another agenda, so be it. We're all moving towards the same means of an end."  
  
Sighing deeply, Ken relented. "I'll leave her alone. That doesn't mean I won't be watching. Trust only yourself, right? Well, she makes me chary, that's what my gut tells me to feel."  
  
Relief from Youji. "Thank you. We need her right now. We're in shambles. She may not look it, but I'd be willing to stake my life on her skills if it came to fight. Hell, she's armed to the teeth as we speak. Someone comes bursting through our front door they'd have one of her bullets between their eyes before you could even draw another breath."  
  
Ken shrugged. "Whatever. I don't trust her. That's all there is to it." Ken sat on the edge of the bed, toeing his sneakers on.  
  
"Join the club." A facetious finger to his lips, Youji backed out of the room.  
  
"I don't like this." Memories of Omi's bloody face lit by the stark glow of a streetlamp. Youji was right. If push came to shove she was still another warm body seemingly on their side.  
  
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -  
  
"I see why this make you all creeped out."  
  
Youji glanced over his shoulder at Fate. "What makes you think this bothered me? I kill people for a living."  
  
"You come see me after first visit here, no? You look plenty upset then."  
  
Watching Aya's face, Youji tried to gage how things would progress. This was where Aya validated his belief. One of them had to be entirely unafraid. He hoped.  
  
Fate bounced forward, an awkwardly young move for her middle-aged frame and face. Some people could pull of cute, some not. Fate had the height and build, but no the spirit. "I tell you not to deal with those atrocious men." She mocked the corpse, dancing around in that obscene, capering parody of youth.  
  
"Definitely scary." Ken brushed against Youji's side, going to examine the fridge. "Very clever," he said in regards to the hidden-room-fridge-contraption. Youji was sure it had some technical name that the now deceased Cobarde had referred to it as, but the dead didn't talk. He hoped.  
  
They all watched as Youji started things up, expressing mixed reactions as the dark stairway revealed itself. Omi grinned and skipped down, eager for a new computer system to examine. He returned in a matter of moments. "Ken, can you go back and get my bag of gear? I'll need something to tap into his system. You guys, can you all look around for another hidden room? There's something else missing, I think."  
  
"What you thinking?"  
  
"Just something I half-way remember. Look for an icon; something with an upside-down triangle I think." Omi frowns.  
  
"A hollow upside-down triangle with a notch on one side." Youji swallowed, that sickness pooling in his stomach again. "I know what he's talking about. You shouldn't find it here. It has something to do with Ko-ishi, I saw enough of it earlier, when-" he stopped.   
  
Ken stepped closer when Aya ignored the outburst. "'S okay, we know what you're talking about. Aya, you and Fate search for that icon. I'll go back to the house and get Omi's stuff. Youji, why don't you help Omi go through files down there?" No one protested as they went about their suggested tasks.  
  
"Are you okay?" Ken found himself asking the question that once again should have come from Aya of all people.  
  
"Yeah." Youji's eyes kept straying back to the dangling corpse.  
  
"Do you want me to take that down first?"  
  
"No, no! Don't touch it! Just leave it there."  
  
Narrowed violet eyes watched the whole encounter, arms crossed below spanning a tense chest. Aya didn't like the atmosphere; it made him antsy. It was hard to concentrate with the hairs on the back of his neck standing on end, telling him danger was near. He gave Youji one last lingering look, leaving him to his own devices.  
  
"Want me to walk you down?" Ken shifted from foot to foot.  
  
"Fuck no. I don't need to be catered to." With a flash of flying flaxen hair, Youji stomped past him, down the stairs. "Go ahead and run off. Errand Boy."  
  
"Youji, help me look." Omi rubbed his forehead with a reddened hand as his comrade huffed down to his level. "I'm trying to move these damned filing cabinets. Give me a hand." He reeled back, balance offset by the sudden rush to his head.  
  
"Whoa, sit down." He caught Omi by the shoulders, propped him up against the one slim sliver of wall showing. "Sit down. Are you alright?"  
  
"My head, all the blood is throbbing behind my eyes, just a bit dizzy." He pushed the heels of his palms against the dark slashes of his eyelids.  
  
"Well don't try to move heavy things by yourself, you'll pop a blood vessel or something." Youji rocked the heavy chest back and forth, inching it forward. By the time he's maneuvered it back a foot from the wall he was sorely out of breath. "This is NOT assassin work." Youji sat next to Omi, long legs splayed before him.  
  
There was a crash up above in the kitchen; the noise filtered by the acoustic challenging damp walls of the stairwell, followed by a rattling that could only be chains.  
  
  
  
"You guys okay up there?" Youji stood, brushing off his behind.  
  
"No." The voice was moist, earthy, bubbling, born on a reeking breath of air.  
  
"This is mine, and you are trespassing." That swinging hundred-watt bulb fully illuminating the ravaged, decaying body from the kitchen before one darkened, dead hand reached out to turn off the light switch.  
  
**************  
  
How's THAT for a cliffhanger! In your face! -spins around- Booyah! I guess this means I've got enough spare time now. Please, keep the startled gasps to yourself. Hehe, okay. Thanks. Well, this means I need to get something else up in a semi-timely manner now, just because everyone loves talking corpses, and I love gory, violent shit. Who doesn't? Anyway, give me feedback, it makes me write faster! It really does! Or give me an e-mail if you would like at darkhunter@ijustdontcare.com or akainobaka@mchsi.com . 


	14. Chapter Fourteen

Well, I just got done watching Resident Evil (the movie with the magical Milla Jovavitch). Not bad, a few cheesy bits, lots of fucking creepy dead people. I don't like walking dead people anymore than you do -shakes her finger- Wow, re-reading through this chapter, I'm now sad that I have lots of animated dead myself. I will never again watch movies having to do with things I'm writing about. -giggles- One of those dead guys looked like someone I used to date though! Even my mommy said so!!! Haahaa. You remember the weirdest things!  
  
**************  
  
"Fucking son of a bitch!" Aya hurled himself helplessly at the wall, trying to pound his way to Youji's rescue. That fucking corpse. It was gone, slimed footsteps leading up to the fridge, no way down. The key was down there with them. "FUCK, FUCK, FUCK!" Slamming him shoulder against floral wallpaper until his leg all but gave out from the pained jolting.  
  
"Big stupid-head." Fate pushed him aside. "I need you for combat-fighting when I get door open, none of this stupid hitting wall thing." She lightly smacked him on the back of the head before opening up that innocent looking refrigerator, knocking the sparsely condimented shelves aside and punching the opened lock mechanism with her bare fist. A shower of sparks and it gave a shuddery lurch, sliding over again to reveal the pitch-black doorway.  
  
He pulled his blade, dashing down without a thought for the uneven fighting grounds. The struggle of bodies barely outlined by the fluorescent bulb up above in the kitchen, he couldn't tell if the underdog being pummeled was one of his teammates, or the walking dead man.  
  
"Get off!" Youji's panicked shout, the top figure reeling back, a warped silhouette from the side. Aya swung, aiming for what he assumed was a throat, clipping air as it leapt back in the dark with inhuman speed.  
  
"Get some goddamned light down here, Woman!" Slashing at it, hoping for any connection to prove it was real, not some new figment of insanity he'd concocted for himself.  
  
"Turn on fucking light switch, stupid man." Fate leapt down, doing it herself, kitchen knife in hand.  
  
"You?" Gurgling rage coming out as frothy old muck from its lungs. Not another word as it hurled Aya to the side, turning and leaping for Fate's throat as she flicked the switch. Once again the corpse leapt back in time to avoid any further damage to its ravaged body, upraised arms blocking light sensitive eyeholes and brushing against the hanging light bulb, sending it swinging, creating shadows and flickers of motion in the corner of all eyes, drawing attention away from the true target.  
  
Taking advantage of their distraction, the body, Cobarde, homed in on his original target, catching Youji up with one arm, muscles bulging through tattered skin as he pulled the blond assassin upright, crook of his elbow cutting off Youji's air supply. "I will snap his neck."  
  
Youji gagged, desperate for air, repulsed by the slabs of tissue sliding against his neck, terrified by this vile nightmare come to life. "Get off, let me go!" Mouthing the words he couldn't find the air to speak, trying to struggle free, desperate for things not to end this way. Vision graying out. This was the closest he'd ever been to death. The comforting numbness was almost better than the reeking cloud of horror surrounding him.  
  
A single gunshot broke the hum of ragged breathing, the slowly fading thumps caused by Youji's flailing heels against the unaffected form behind him. Youji fell forwards as Cobarde released him, the walking dead man staggering back against one computer column.  
  
"Fucking bitch." One hand rising up to feel the slick matter draining from the hole in its head, movements faltering, slumping over the glowing keys on the control panel.  
  
Fate twirled her handgun across her fingertips before slamming it firmly into its shoulder holster. "Fuck you too." Grim. "He is not necessarily dead yet," she announced as Cobarde fell the final few feet to the floor, "You keep an eye on him. I go find something for chopping."  
  
"Youji! Youji!" Omi wobbled to his feet, stumbling over to Youji, Aya following suite.  
  
Breaths so sharp they sounded painful wrenched themselves from Youji's throat. Aya crouched down, resting one hand on Youji's back. "No! Get back." He pushed all helping hands away. "Don't touch me." Arms curling around his torso. "My back, what's wrong with my back?" Shuddering, rubbing at the pilled up film of greasy skin stuck to his neck. "Get it off me!" For a moment the nightmare world swells and encompasses his waking reality.  
  
"Calm down, calm down, we'll fix it." Omi gingerly pulled away the torn shreds of shirt from Youji's back. "It's all sliced up. What's happened?"  
  
"His ribs." Aya turned away, mouth twisted with disgust. "Those pulled apart ribs cut Youji's back while he was being strangled." He pivoted on his heel, arms clamped tightly across his chest, eyes riveted on the still body lying behind Youji.  
  
"Are you okay?"  
  
Youji shook his head. "Just leave me alone for a minute."  
  
Omi backed off, hands coming up to rub at his temples. "Is it moving again, Aya?"  
  
"No."  
  
"This will do the trick just fine." Fate sauntered back down; rusted axe casually slung over one shoulder. "You hold gun and shoot his face if he try to move away when I start with chopping." Fate swung the axe up over her head, lips spread in a truly inspired grin of insanity. After the first few moist sounding squelches, Omi and Aya turned away, repulsed.  
  
"Hey, what happened here? Our dead guy get up and walk?" Ken peered down the stairwell, tone light and joking. "Holy SHIT!" He thumped the rest of the way down. "What did I miss? Omi are you okay? Youji?" He ducked down next to Omi first, trying to get a glimpse of his face while alternately examining Youji's lacerated back and gawking at Fate's enthusiastic dismembering.  
  
Aya chose to wash his hands of the whole affair, heading for the brighter, saner kitchen, steps hindered once again as the adrenaline rush wore off. Youji could have emotional spasms without his assistance. Heartless though he was often assumed to be, there were still feelings hiding beneath layers of calculated insensitivity. Only one rejection was necessary to get the hint across with Aya Fujimiya. He was being shunned, punished for some triviality he'd failed to consider in this rapidly warping relationship of convenience he shared with his teammate. If only he could work up the need to escape to replace to dull sense of melancholy that gripped his chest.  
  
"If this gets infected I am going to be pissed!"  
  
He heard Youji regaining his equilibrium one flight down, complaining and fussing as was his want. It was almost disappointing to find his name left out of the blustery speech. It didn't matter. Aya pointedly examined the large hunks of flesh still caught on the dangling meat hooks, swinging from the middle of the room; pointedly ignored Youji's reemergence, his mindless whining.  
  
"If you bathe like smart human person, it will heal just fine. Scratches not deep." Fate snorted her disgust with all stupid, hypochondriac males. She followed closely behind Ken and Omi, swinging what might be an arm in one hand, and dragging a ropey leg behind her, bumping up the stairs.  
  
"Let's say we call it a day, eh?" Ken nervously darted a glance from Youji to Omi, and then with a tad more mistrust at Fate. "You knew he wasn't dead, didn't you? Why exactly did we come back here and leave him hanging up there then?"  
  
Fate shrugged. "Pure entertainment value." She applied herself to the task of clearing out the moldering dishes from Cobarde's sink. Ken could only hope she wasn't going to utilize the garbage disposal as he suspected she would. He didn't think it was made to handle human bones.  
  
"Let's say we wait until psycho bitch is done playing with body parts and then go back down there and get some work done." Youji straightened up, jaw set. "We don't have time to put things off until we feel like it. Fate, how soon can you and your macabre little friend clear out?" He tilted his head to the side, ignoring the draft chilling his back. He'd forgo a new shirt at this point, to get it all over with once and for all. "If we leave, I'm not coming back here."  
  
"Give me fifteen minutes, I make it all sparkly for you."  
  
"My assistance is not necessary here." Aya reclaimed his coat from a Formica countertop.  
  
"Where are you going?" The determination melted away from Youji's face, caught up in the dread of the house once again.  
  
"To pursue my own venues. There remains, as you stated, very little time." There wasn't anything to say in reply to that, and he leaft without any further protests, already caught up once again in the cloud of his own contemplation.  
  
"This sister thing. I never got a chance to really ask you about it?" Ken asked some time later, leaning over Youji's shoulder as he thumbed through countless manila folders without any rhyme or reason, searching as erratically as Omi on the computer, hoping luck would hold and bring something to the surface.  
  
"You know as much now as I do."  
  
"Is she in here, can we pull up a physical file now?" Ken reaches for the "F" drawer.  
  
"I pulled the file and took it home with me yesterday."  
  
"And?"  
  
"And Aya commandeered it and I haven't seen it since." He sighed.  
  
"Omi, look up Fujimiya as soon as you've got a handle on the system." Ken transferred shoulders, sensing Youji wanted some time off to mope on his own. The team dynamic was holding without Aya; his presence so removed as to be non-existent for the most part even when he was physically present.  
  
"You think Cobarde would mind if I went to use his shower facility?" Fate's accent steadily evolved, coming closer and closer to something recognizable as more time passed, though her grammar and vocabulary continued to fluctuate.   
  
Youji was unable to decide if she was the biggest faker in the world, or simply insane beyond all comprehension. He was opting for the later of the two. He wished Aya were here to hazard a guess of his own. He wished Aya had a sense of humor to hazard a guess with. A fresh shirt would be nice too. The antibiotic Omi had coated the shallow, stinging scratches with seemed to cool with the air around them, raising goosebumps on his arms.  
  
"Any little bit left of him you didn't manage to slice up and fit down the garbage disposal probably lacks the capability to make any displeasure known." Omi smiled, warming to Fate's quirky nature in a way none of his three partners seem able to. It most likely helped that every other sentence directed at him by the devil woman didn't involve the words "stupid" or "idiot". Yup, definitely a point of consideration.  
  
The phone rang.  
  
Cobarde's house phone rang.  
  
They shared shocked looks and hesitant shrugs, crowding into the living room to stare at the machine. Four more rings and the machine kicked in. They listened to a dead man's voice inviting the caller to leave a message.  
  
"Hello insipid ones. Having a lovely time in Wonderland?" The voice that answered Cobarde's incitement sentYouji reeling backwards.  
  
"Why don't you pick up? It's silly to pretend when I can see you all standing right there, watching the phone, waiting for it to leap to life."  
  
"Oh gods, no. No." Youji's head shook in denial.  
  
"I imagine you're a little startled, Mr. Kudou. Why don't you pick up the phone so we can... chat."  
  
Ken's arm lashed out, white knuckled as he shouted into the phone. "Fuck you! Fuck you! Leave us alone. You're dead and it's through." He slammed the receiver back into its cradle before he could think twice.  
  
Youji's hand shook as he reached for Ken's sleeve. "I don't think that was a good idea." He whispered the words, unwilling to add the volume that might make them real.  
  
In the kitchen, the distinctive ringer of Youji's cell phone sounded, making everyone jump again, the chirpy cartoon melody contrasting horribly with the gravity of the situation. No one wanted to step back around the corner to answer the phone, half-expecting a pile of sludge to be reforming into their walking horror-movie friend as it oozed back up the drain. An empty kitchen awaited them, air resonating with the endless perk on his phone.  
  
"Don't answer it." Omi caught both of their arms, leaving Fate on the outside of their semi-circle. "Don't answer it."  
  
"I have to. Aya's gone." The sound halted as Youji's hand hovered indecisively. A moments pause as the same number was doubtlessly re-dialed before the song started up again.  
  
"Hello?" Dry mouthed and wide eyed, he turned to watch Ken and Omi.  
  
"That was foolish of you to leave your home unguarded again. Almost as moronic as your decision to side with the raving lunatic." It took Youji a moment in his fog of terror to realize the reference was made to describe Fate.  
  
"What do you want, Ko-Ishi?"  
  
"You have been busy. Do you know all about me now?" The cruel smile was apparent even through the static of his cellular connection. "Do you know what I really am, what I want you for? Do you know what you have done?"  
  
Youji didn't know how to reply. He wished Aya were here. He could use Aya's icy silence, his strength of being. He wished Ken or Omi would come to stand by him so he could close his eyes and feel less abandoned.  
  
"I would be willing to make a trade of course. I'm a reasonable evil as far as things like that go. You for the darling little sister."  
  
A painfully dry swallow as Youji clenched the counter behind him. Here came the clincher. Aya couldn't know. In his mind there was no other outcome. If Aya knew he would drug and bind Youji himself to regain his sister, the real Aya.  
  
"I thought not. That will come later then. Your level of articulation seems somewhat diminished since we last conversed. You were so artful in your pleas for mercy; it's a sad contrast. Perhaps you could turn the phone over to the worthless boy with the volatile temper. After you all hastily exit the building of course. Time is of the essence. It would be a shame if our game were to end here with the demolition of the building."  
  
"Get out now. He's going to blow the house up." Youji sprung into action as realization galvanized him to break the fit of paralysis. "We have to get out now." He pushed Fate when she didn't start running fast enough, they hit the door way as the first rumble could be felt from beneath the building, the following draft of roasting air throwing them several yards across the tidy front lawn. Despite his overwhelming desire, the phone remained clenched in his hand, undamaged and still connected.  
  
"Didn't have time to grab any of those precious files, did you? Are you out of the loop again, Weiss?" Ko-Ishi tried to worm his way into Youji's brain through his ear canal, utilizing sound waves. "Should I wait until the illustrious Ran Fujimiya returns to your own untouched home and call him to ask about a grounds for trade? I'm sure he'd be much more willing to negotiate."  
  
"No." Soft with dread.  
  
"Youji, give me the phone. Don't talk to him anymore. Give me the phone."  
  
"Yes, give him the phone. I think I like your friend. He intrigues me."  
  
"You fucking son of a bitch-" Ken started out in full rant and then fell silent. After a matter of seconds the information screen glowed green, signaling a disconnection.  
  
"What did he say?" Omi scrambled to his feet, glancing warily about in fading twilight.  
  
"All our days are numbered."  
  
**************  
  
First draft done at 5:30 exactly in the morning. I love not sleeping. It gives me so much more fun time to play around with. Not. Hey! Oi! Bum head! Send me an e-mail or something!! Akainobaka@mchsi.com or darkhunter@ijustdontcare.com 


	15. Chapter 15

Wooo hoo. I'm always amazed when I find the attention span to write yet one more chapter instead of running away to the land of magic cheesy sticks and raising a family of uhm... things. Wait, what was I talking about again? Ooo, cheesy sticks. -drools-  
  
**************  
  
The ride home hours later was terse and wary. Ken drove their remaining vehicle, taking many a scenic route to prevent Ko-Ishi from tailing them in the odd event he hadn't found their new home yet. Chances were, he not only knew where their house was, but had gone and wired the foundation with explosives while they'd been out. Maybe this time he wouldn't be nice enough to warn them to leave the building before detonation.  
  
The car Aya had driven off in was parked stolidly in the middle of the driveway. One less problem, Youji hoped. If Ko-Ishi had both Ayas, then everything was basically fucked. There would be no day of reckoning because Weiss would simply fall apart. Youji couldn't help but cross his fingers as he pushed open the door.  
  
"Aya?" Omi called, doing what Youji's miffed pride could not. It was too much like a 'honey I'm home' greeting, and he refused to play any roles not predetermined by himself. "Where are you?"  
  
The cause of concern faded out of the darkness of the den, framed by the gloomy doorway like any gothic wastrel's dream Kodak Moment, all pale skin and artful shadows. "Here." What might have been a slight, sardonic grin played about his lips.  
  
"Aya?" Omi's tone changed as he picked up on something Youji couldn't fathom right off the bat. "Aya, are you drunk?"  
  
"Yes." Not the slightest bit chagrined by the accusation, not showing any signs of shame. Youji wondered at his monosyllabic answers more than the unusual scene of a drunken Aya.   
  
"Ko-Ishi:3, Us:Zip." Ken shouldered past Omi and Youji, angry. "He blew up Cobarde's house, while we were still in it. And he called Youji on the phone; he's playing some sort of game."  
  
"Yes." Aya complacently agreed yet again, beyond not paying attention.  
  
"Youji gave you the only copies of the few files salvaged from this new mess. Where are they?"  
  
"The kitchen table." And with this contribution, Aya turned and retreated back into the black solitude of the living room, reseating himself on the couch, hoping no one would follow him. Wish granted.  
  
In the kitchen they squabbled over who would deal with what. All of them wanted "Fujimiya, Aya" or "Fujimiya, Ran". None of them wanted Ko-Ishi's file. It would be too disheartening.  
  
"Fine! I read this then. You too afraid to see real truth." Fate snatched up their nemesis's compiled records. "Is nothing I don't know already."  
  
"You don't like reading anyway, Youji!" Omi stuck out his lower lip. "Why change now? Look, there are two left, and our curiosities are insatiable. Why don't you go see what's wrong with Aya, and Ken and I will tell you the short version of what we find?"  
  
Youji frowned. "Ignoring the implication that I'm a stupid dolt, I'll accept that as a solution for now." He crossed the room, staring into the living room, watching the glint of glass in darkness as Aya continued to dose himself with Youji's favorite cure-all.  
  
"This is unexpected." Youji carefully made his way across the room, feeling ahead with his toes before moving his whole body to follow. He was finished falling over things for today. "Do you have any left to share?" He'd better! That was Youji's liquor stock he was depleting. It had to be. Aya probably couldn't find his way to a liquor store if there were neon signs lining the streets with explicit instructions and big gaudy arrows pointing the way.  
  
There was an audible slosh as Aya brandished his glass too quickly, spilling liquid onto the floor. "I'm done now. You can have it." His words aren't slurred, but the cadence is off, different from his usual measured tones.  
  
Sighing, Youji retrieved the glass, swishing the amber colored liquid around. He took a sip and grimaced. "How much of this stuff have you put away?" He shrugged and drained the remaining inches in the glass, figuring he could use a bit of a bracer himself. Reaching into his pocket, Youji placed the cell phone on the coffee table between them.  
  
"So, I've got to ask. What's going on?" Youji turned, resting his palm on Aya's knee, squeezing denim-clad flesh. "I thought you loathed liquor."  
  
Aya looked up, eyes bleary. "I loathe myself." He reached for the black labeled bottle again, frown creasing his forehead as he realized it was empty. Youji jumped as the glass shattered against the farthest wall.  
  
"Youji?" Ken peeped around the door way, concerned.  
  
Youji flapped his hand in the direction of the kitchen and turned his attention back to Aya. "I definitely think you've had enough to drink, kiddo. Want to tell me what's going on now?"  
  
Aya twisted the empty glass in his hands, rubbing the raised ridges. For a moment he considered hurling it against the wall as well, just for the violence of the sound. Everything was wrong. She was still gone, and he was useless. He couldn't even look for her, for his life, limping and useless. There was nothing else that mattered and he couldn't do it himself, and he couldn't rely on anyone else. What was there left to feel but a deep and bitter loathing for the person he'd become?  
  
"Aya?" Youji shifted a little bit closer, trying to make out a facial expression in the twilight. "Ba-Aya, I don't know what's wrong. I cannot read minds. Tell me you remember having this discussion numerous times before this, please. I can't read your thoughts. I don't know what's going on except for what you tell me." He'd almost slipped up there. It was hard not to whip out unwelcome endearing names when he was trying to reason with Aya, but it would be harder to take back if he was caught. Tenderness was nothing something expected or welcomed in this relationship, and he had to keep that in mind.  
  
"Ko-Ishi called you?" He looked up, proving he'd been listening a little bit at least. "On that phone." When Youji nodded he frowned again. "Couldn't you do a call trace, and find out where it came from."  
  
"This is fucking Ko-Ishi we're talking about! Do you think he'd be stupid enough to just pick up his fucking home phone and dial my cell? If he's even half as evil as Fate tells us, we're in a shit load of trouble, because he is one crafty son of a bitch."  
  
"What did he want?"  
  
"He wants us all to suffer. That's his gimmick. He doesn't really want anything specific. That would make it all easier. Chaos, suffering, pain, despair. Those are his only goals." That and the reclaiming of his new favorite play toy, Youji Kudou. There was something worth keeping to himself.  
  
"Is that what he told you?" Aya dipped his finger into a small spill of liquor and doodled circles, attention waning when his sister didn't come into the conversation. Listless. He started pacing, awkward gait only serving to further grate on his nerves. Youji didn't bother to reply, knowing he didn't really care either way.  
  
"Fuck this. Aya, if you're just going to mope and pace, I'm going elsewhere until you're actually willing to accept my help or offer some of your own."  
  
Aya shrugged, lost in contemplation. After Youji stomped out of the room, he reclaimed the couch, sprawled out, caught up in his spiral of depression. No one could possibly understand why this was so horrible. It wasn't his sister being gone. It wasn't an adversary back from the dead. It was the hopelessness of it all. It was his problem, and he couldn't solve it. He was too busy beating himself up, or falling down when his weakness betrayed him.   
  
The silence of the living room amplified the sounds throughout the house several times. He listened to the muted tones of discussion from the kitchen, catching inflection, but none of the words. He wished he had the guts to join them, to ask Youji to come back and talk to him. Instead, he planned on heading back upstairs and seeing what else Youji had stockpiled in the spare bedroom. How drunk could he get before he started throwing up. That was the question for the evening.  
  
His brooding was disturbed by the soft melody of Youji's cellular phone, forgotten on the table. He picked it up, face lit by the soft blue glow of the screen, reading the expected 'unknown caller' message. On impulse, he opted to answer the phone, anything to break this existence. Perhaps he'd find an excuse to rejoin his teammates in the kitchen without a sacrifice of pride.  
  
"Yes?" Quite and toneless as he waited, torn between hurrying to the kitchen and retreating upstairs with the phone, waiting for his final deciding factor.  
  
"Ah, Mr. Fujimiya, I presume. Delightful. Are you screening calls this evening?"  
  
Definitely the stairs. "Tell me where my sister is." It wasn't an inquiry; it was a demand.  
  
"Concise and to the point. I knew there was a reason I liked you."  
  
"Where is Aya?"  
  
"I can't tell you where she is now, of course, but I can certainly tell you where she'll be."  
  
"I'm waiting." Waiting for some threat, or taunt.  
  
"At the old burnt flower shop you used to inhabit, around one o' clock in the evening, exactly seven days from now. If you bring that lovely blonde creature of yours, that is. I'd be willing to arrange a trade. He has something that I want."  
  
Trade Youji for Aya? He shouldn't be torn, because both were unacceptable. He should discard Youji, to preserve his way of life, to protect his sister until she awoke again. He should protect Youji, the only living, breathing, talking, caring being left that mattered to him now. Both were acceptable losses. He'd given up everything for Aya, and Youji was still just a convenient fuck, right? Youji could take more of Ko-Ishi and his sadistic delights until he could be traced and rescued, but could Aya really do that to him, someone who'd stood by him and stood up for him times uncounted. Two different options presented themselves, both saying he shouldn't even be considering the other.  
  
"Your silence annoys me. Should I pack her baggage?" A slight laugh. "Or should I simply slit her throat as we speak? She wouldn't feel a thing, I assure you. As dead inside her own mind as you will be if you don't cooperate. Give him to me, and I'll return your corpse of a sister."  
  
"I'll have to think about it."  
  
"Because if you take too long, I'll go after him myself, and you'll lose both. I'll be in touch." The tinny click signaled the end of a disturbing conversation.  
  
"Hey, Aya, where'd you disappear to?" Youji's voice echoed up the stairs from the living room, a tad hesitant.  
  
Aya turned the phone off, gently placing it in it's charging cradle, painfully sober now.  
  
"I'm upstairs."  
  
"Are you okay? I'm sorry; I'll come up if you want. We don't have to talk or anything... just if you wanted the company, you know, I'm here."  
  
"That won't be necessary."  
  
A defeated sight that he probably wasn't meant to hear made its way down the hallway, tracing the same path Youji's spoken words had flown. Something in the pit of his stomach twisted for a moment, before remembering the role it was required to play and settling back into the dull nothingness he was supposed to feel. He turned and sat on the edge of their bed, still in the total darkness that did little to improve his outlook. It was more suitable to the decisions he would be forced to contemplate.  
  
"So, he's drunk and he's just blowing it all off for now?" Ken turned in his chair as Youji huffed around the kitchen, interfering with the studious atmosphere in general. "Why can't he do that with the things that really don't matter? We should get him drunk some time when we AREN'T all going to die." He was mostly joking.  
  
"Yeah, whatever. So, what are you finding out? Help me out here, O Hogger of Files of Importance?" Youji tried not to jitter, some of Aya's earlier listlessness having rubbed off on him.  
  
Ken and Omi exchanged Evil Grins across the table. "Actually, we're not going to tell you."  
  
"What the fuck?" Youji made a snatch for the closest stack of papers only to be thwarted by Omi's reflexes, a notch or two above his at the end of a long, tiring day.  
  
"Yup. You're sleeping with the guy, you should find out from him." A deceptively sweet and innocent smile from the golden boy. Youji wasn't sure whether or not Omi was truly serious.  
  
"That's hardly fair." A hint of a whine creeping in. There had to be something to make this day bearable. What next? A phone call from Ko-Ishi to Aya, outlining his previous plan? Why did that implausible concept send a shiver of trepidation down his spine? Oh shit! He'd forgotten the phone in the living room. "I'll be right back."  
  
It wasn't on the table, where it rightly should be. He'd have to brave Aya's wrath after all. Carefully silent going up the stairs, just in case Aya had decided to get some sleep, or pass out as his alcohol tolerance dictated. Dark still, no candles or lamps lit to shed light on the situation.  
  
"Aya?"  
  
"Hmm?" Soft, but not slurred with sleep.  
  
"Where did my phone go?" Resting his palm against the wood of the doorway, waiting for an answer, Youji wondered at the almost guilty feel of the pause that ensues.  
  
"It's charging." Aya finally allowed.  
  
"Aya, are you all right?"  
  
"No."  
  
"Are you sure you don't want to talk?"  
  
"Yes."  
  
"Goodnight."  
  
Youji tread heavily down the stairs back to the kitchen, trying to warm himself with the cheerful presences waiting for him there.  
  
**************  
  
Will my sadism NEVER end? Will I rest before completely destroying any and all happiness for the lovely boys of Weiss?? Prolly, but it wouldn't hurt to prepare yourselves for MUCH angst in the future! Woot Woot for angst!!!! Woot woot for foreshadowing!!! WOOT WOOOOOOOT -explodes in a cloud of feathers!- E-mail me at akainobaka@mchsi.com or darkhunter@ijustdontcare.com !!! E-MAIL ME OR GIVE ME FEEDBACK... OR DIIIIIEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!! Woot! ^_^ 


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